Gone to Earth
by Experimental
Summary: Sequel to Damaged. Enma's manhunt for Tsuzuki continues. As the noose tightens, Hisoka must make good on his promise to find him first, but a new partner demands his attention. While the Judgment Bureau fractures from within, infernal forces gather, with designs on the rogue shinigami that may alter the balance of power between the realms.
1. With a burning candle

**Note**, this is a continuation of a previous story of mine, **Damaged**, which can be found here on this site and AO3. Reading it first will _probably _make this make more sense. Standard disclaimers apply. Natsume and K are pulled from Matsushita's own sketches, but extrapolations of character are my fault. Chapter titles will be lines from the song of the same title by David Sylvian.

* * *

Gone to Earth

Not for the first time that night, Hisoka cursed his slowness. For all the abilities that he had gained in his time as a shinigami, the power to run significantly faster than when alive was definitely _not _one of them. And, unfortunately for him, his levitation skills were still fair-weather at best, and teleportation would be counterproductive.

And—damn it—he was _dead, _so why did he feel so out of breath?

He slowed his pace just for a second—just long enough to feel the ache spread through his legs, and the subway tunnel rumble beneath him. A tremendous roar echoed down the pipes, seeming to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.

But it wasn't that alone that made the ground jerk like an earthquake. It was the massive body of his quarry, and Hisoka could feel its approach. _It_ was following _him_, like a dog on his scent.

Scratch that: like a flood of dogs. Like a raging torrent of bloodthirsty hellhounds pounding through the Fukuoka subway system. Maybe it shouldn't have been as frightening as being chased by a relentless, self-aware sword bent on his destruction, in the grand scheme of things, but somehow it was. It was equally terrifying—just in an entirely different way.

He picked up the pace again, running as fast as his legs could carry him. _You're doing great, almost there_, a voice whispered in his ear, just as he was thinking the same thing. The trap lay just ahead, and so far his mark was making fast for it without even a clue as to what awaited it. Hisoka could see its pale glow up ahead as he rounded the corner—

And was nearly bowled over by a black, shapeless mass exploding from the service tunnel doorway.

Instinct kicked in. Throwing his hands up in front of his face, he dematerialized before he could be overtaken, and re-entered above the containment circle he had drawn on the tunnel floor. In its faint light, he finally got a good look at the thing in its entirety.

For all the good that did him. A clear view was more terrifying than mere glimpses and guess work. The thing had no concrete body, no skeletal structure or muscle definition. It was a flood of black goo, constantly reshaping itself before Hisoka's eyes into somethingvaguelyapproaching a velvet worm, only far more massive and angry and loud than any worm he'd ever seen.

And worst of all was the hunger. It rolled off the creature as bad as its stench, threatening to bowl through Hisoka's mental walls. There was nothing else it felt. No fear, no hatred. Just . . . _hunger._

"Ugly son of a bitch, innit?" Natsume said, appearing beside him. He suppressed a shudder. "Now comes the hard part."

"On the contrary. This part I can handle." The creature was moving closer to the trap. "Any second now. . . ."

If the creature had eyes, it either didn't know what the circle was for or didn't care, as it moved its bulk onto the glowing lines. Now I've got you, Hisoka thought. Any second now, the bonds written into the circle would flare to life, the creature would be trapped, and the two of them could work on figuring out a) what in Enma's good name it was, and b) how to go about neutralizing it.

But the circle did nothing to stop it. The creature just ignored the markings as if they didn't exist, and Hisoka and his partner had no option but to throw themselves out of its way or be swallowed up in one of its constantly reforming, gaping maws.

He heard Natsume's curse echo off the concrete walls as the thing split itself in half to go after them. "I had a feeling that wasn't going to work!"

You had a feeling? "_You had a feeling?_" Hisoka yelled back. "Why didn't you_ tell_ me!"

"I thought you wrote the spell wrong on purpose!" the other said, before a close nip from behind shut him up.

Hisoka swore under his breath as he rolled and dodged the hungry mouth coming after him, six sawtoothed jaws unhinging the better to grab him with. So far, nothing had worked to subdue the creature, let alone injure it. His sword was useless; it just reformed around the blade. Some of Natsume's fuda gave it pause, but only as much as a tummy tickle, and the two of them hadn't a moment of peace in which to put their heads together about getting rid of it. The circle had been Hisoka's last hope. He'd thought that if he could just ensnare the creature long enough, he could perform an exorcism spell and banish it to whatever realm it had oozed out from.

And what was this about inscribing the circle wrong? There was no way, Hisoka thought. He wasn't a newbie at this; he'd written a dozen circles before, he knew how they worked. Could he really have messed it up, and not even been aware of it?

_It's okay! _Natsume shouted over their neural connection as they ran. _I had a back-up plan just in case. There's a station up ahead about five hundred meters. Hang a left._

A map of the tunnels flashed clearly across Hisoka's inner eye. One thing Hisoka had to give his new partner credit for, he was just as strong a telepathic communicator in the field as Tsuzuki. When it came to the communication of visual information, even more that should have been no surprise: Natsume made it quite clear to anyone with ears how much he loved maps, and judging by the notes he took in their briefings, he seemed to be more of a spatial thinker than Tsuzuki ever was. All things considered, at least it was a welcome change to have a partner who didn't get lost on his way to the _konbini_ around the corner.

_Do you think you can hold out until then?_

A glance over his shoulder told Hisoka the monster was staying close, but not closing the gap. At least not very quickly. Either it was toying with him, or it took time to move all that mass; and Hisoka sincerely hoped it wasn't the former.

_No problem, _he sent back. _You think your back-up plan can deliver?_

A nervous chuckle was all he got in response. Real encouraging.

It had better work, was all Hisoka had to say to that. He was tired of this thing breathing down his neck, with its fetid vapors, its overwhelming appetite. The light changed up ahead, and he was relieved to see Natsume emerge from an adjacent tunnel, his half of the monster gushing close behind.

Hisoka looked down at the center of the chamber and his hopes sank. "A box. That's your big back-up plan? It's no bigger than a toaster!"

"Ever heard of big things in small packages, my friend? Now, if you please, Kurosaki, be a lamb and hit that thing with a binding spell." Natsume cracked a knuckle. "Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown."

Hisoka complied—and just in time, too, as oily appendages crashed against his shield bubble and oozed around the two of them, encircling them—but he didn't see what good that was going to do for more than a few seconds.

Apparently that was all he needed. Natsume activated a switch on the box at the same instant Hisoka spoke the last syllable of the spell, and something unexpected happened. A violet light shot out of the box and encircled the viscous monster, as if grasping it with a dozen hands of pure electricity. And then it pulled.

The creature stood its ground—for about two seconds, before it was stretched and sucked meter by incessant meter into the box. No amount of struggling or self-dividing could save it. Every last piece of its oily, sludge-like mass was soon neatly packaged and secure. The box shut its lid, and, job done, sat there on the concrete and hissed.

Leaving a dumbfounded Hisoka wondering what had just happened.

"_Phew!_" Natsume made a show of clearing the air. "And I thought they smelled bad on the outside."

Now that Hisoka could breathe a little easier, without a giant worm trying to devour him at every turn, he didn't mind a little stink. It was the lack of warning ahead of time that irked him now. If Natsume had had this device on him the entire time, he might have said something, oh, before they entered the subway and saved Hisoka the trouble. There were two in this partnership, and if one of them wasn't willing to be a team player—

Hisoka pointed at the box. "Mind explaining what the hell that was?"

"Beats me," his partner said, "but I've got a few ideas. Think Watari will appreciate us bringing him our leftovers?" He drew a plastic bag from the inside of his suit jacket, shook it out, and prodded the box experimentally. He snatched his hand back with a start. It was like touching liquid nitrogen.

"I meant that device! Are you sure it can hold that creature? Because I'm pretty sure if it was that easy to capture and secure ghosts and demons, all shinigami in the field would be issued those things by now."

Natsume looked up at him over the rim of his glasses with a crooked grin. "Maybe they should," he said, entirely missing the skepticism in Hisoka's comment. "It's the twenty-first century, for chrissakes. Why is Summons still using eleventh-century technology? Now, the bigger question is, why are they sending the Summons Division to clean up monsters?"

Because the Peacekeeping Force is all out searching for Tsuzuki. But Hisoka kept his mouth shut. If it hadn't been a rhetorical question, the last thing he needed was to get into it about Meifu politics with this guy.

He still wasn't even sure if he trusted Natsume. He was told when they were assigned the same desk that the guy used to be Tsuzuki's partner—once upon a very short time in the 1980s—before he was transferred to the accounting office, where he had been working in Billing for the past decade or so. (Naturally, he was the apple of Tatsumi's eye, not least of which for his uncanny ability to stretch a yen.) He had been young when he died, a university student no older than twenty-one, and sometimes his maturity level showed it. Other times, the bespectacled young man struck Hisoka as a happy medium between Tatsumi and Watari—professional and polished when he needed to be, well-read and a genius with numbers; but a tad crude in the lingo, and annoying with the endless quotes Hisoka did not understand. So far they'd gotten along well enough, except . . .

Well, Natsume's tendency toward absent-mindedness when it came to sharing crucial information _before _it became a matter of life and death was one area where there was room for improvement. Too many years spent working solo in front of a computer screen back in Juuohcho didn't exactly nurture the kind of communication skills necessary to a partnership.

"Maybe they didn't know what we would be up against when they sent us out here," Hisoka said. "We were told to find out what was causing the weird quakes and sink holes because people died as a result of them. That's perfectly within our division's duties, even if they weren't directly targeted for death."

"Well, I guess you have a point there. In any case, crisis averted and another mystery solved, eh, Watson? At least where the quakes are concerned." Natsume looked at his watch. "What d'you say we get out of here, Kurosaki? It's late, we smell like a sewer, and K's not going to be happy if I'm not back in the next ten minutes to give her her dinner."

"I think she'll live," Hisoka said, rolling his eyes as his partner went about securing their catch. "She _is _already dead."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later found them back in their hotel room, where Natsume's calico cat had been waiting restlessly for their return. Maybe it was Hisoka's imagination, but he thought he caught a bit of a glare in K's gaze, as if to say, What kept you so long? He couldn't be sure, though. For some reason, his empathy only rarely worked on animals, and never on house cats.

Natsume immediately started apologizing for being late. "You would _not _want to see what we saw today, believe you me. You'd never eat eel again, that's for sure."

He opened a can of cat food, sniffed its contents, and grabbed a small plate and fork.

"I know it's been a while since I've been out in the field like this," he said to Hisoka, "but ghosts, demons, kami—I ain't seen nothing like this in my career."

"Tsuzuki and I have experience dealing with a wide range of monsters. That's probably why Tatsumi felt, whatever it was, we could handle it." Where this unconscious need to defend the man came from, Hisoka couldn't be sure, but everyone around the office had become more like family since Tsuzuki disappeared and the chief went off on his mysterious leave of absence. Tight, defensive, secretive among themselves. Closer. _A slowly shrinking family. . . . _

It was only natural for Hisoka to want to protect those whom he had left. And the decisions they made.

"But I bet you never encountered anything like _that_."

"No. No, we didn't."

A smug smile from Natsume—and, unless Hisoka was just imagining things, from K as well. His partner rooted around in a plastic grocery bag and produced two cup ramen. "That's because you've never encountered a shoggoth. Chicken and onion, or extra spicy kimchi?"

"Shoggoth?" Hisoka raised an eyebrow. Now he was just making terms up.

But Natsume nodded wholeheartedly, helping himself to the kimchi cup in lieu of no answer. "That's right. Or blob monsters, semi-sentient slime molds, giant shape-shifting amoebas. Truly primitive creatures, whatever you want to call them. Like, the titans _before _the titans. I'm talking _chaos monster_ type of shit. At least, that's my working theory until we can get that thing to a lab and learn more.

"But I don't see why they even have us out hunting the likes of them to begin with. Granted, Tatsumi probably didn't even know what we were dealing with when he handed us the job. Not that Konoe would have had any better intel. For all anyone could tell, it looked like the work of a demon or possibly some low-level kami—but even that is more of a job for Peace-Keeping. We've got real human souls to take care of, we don't have time to run around slaying giants on top of everything else. Maybe if they stopped to ask themselves whether hunting down one of our own for simply abandoning his post is really the best use of the available resources, we wouldn't even be here tonight.

"Then again, we were finally able to see our sweet little demon-trapping machine in action, so overall I'd say it was time well spent—"

"I'm going for a walk."

The words just kind of slipped out before Hisoka really had a plan together, but just like that, he was grabbing his jacket off the back of the chair, and slipping on his shoes in the entryway. "Without dinner?" Natsume said as he poured hot water into his instant ramen.

Food was the last thing on Hisoka's mind, and thinking about those artificially flavored noodles only turned his stomach. "Maybe later. I'd rather get some fresh air right now."

"Suit yourself. We'll be here."

It wasn't anything personal, but Hisoka just had to get out of that hotel room. He hadn't realized it until the idea presented itself. He just had to be alone. He needed some peace and quiet—so he could deal with his own screaming thoughts.

Alright. Maybe it was personal. But nothing Natsume could help. Hisoka found his personality a bit grating, but after all the same could be said for Tsuzuki on the first case they worked together. He was an OK partner, Natsume, as far as partners went—Hisoka didn't have much to compare him to aside from Tsuzuki, just the few brief cases he had worked with Terazuma and Wakaba since Tsuzuki's disappearance, and Watari hardly even counted—but he _just wasn't Tsuzuki._

Stop it, he told himself. Natsume's not here to replace him. And thinking like that, resisting his help, even resenting it, was only going to make their working relationship more tense and awkward than it already was. He's a sub, Hisoka repeated to himself like a mantra. A temp, just holding Tsuzuki's place until he comes back. Nothing more.

But _when _was Tsuzuki coming back? That was something no one was able to answer. And the longer his absence went on, the more that "when" began to look like an "if."

He couldn't allow himself to think in those terms. But at the same time, he knew Tsuzuki, and knowing him, having been there through his dark periods, knew what Tsuzuki was capable of. What he was capable of doing when there was no one around to stabilize him.

Damn it, but Tsuzuki had been right after Kyoto. Maybe Hisoka didn't always want the responsibility, but somehow, through all the years and all the cases they had worked together, he had become Tsuzuki's center of emotional balance. That was why Tatsumi and the chief relied so heavily on him: not to keep Tsuzuki focused on the job, but to keep him from going off his rocker, doing something insane. Something like destroying a building—or himself.

Granted, Hisoka's influence hadn't always worked, but it had been better than nothing. However, after the last case. . . .

I should have seen it coming, he thought, his fists clenching at his side as he slowed under the cool spring air. I blamed him for not being there for _me _when _I _needed him, but I was just as blind, and selfish. I had no way of knowing what Muraki said to him, but I should have seen how extensive the damage was. I should have done something. I could have—

What? Stopped him from running away? It was easy for Hisoka to say that now, but the truth was, he didn't know what would have happened if he'd reacted to their last case differently. Maybe he would have only made things worse. Maybe they wouldn't have changed at all.

But maybe—how could he not think it?—maybe he could have prevented this mess they were in now.

Hisoka hadn't given much conscious thought to where he was going. A faint sound of music made him stop, and try to catch it, hold on to it. It was a melody, sensual and melancholy, the tenuous vibrations of a violin, and the source seemed to be close by. It pulled at him, gently, but not taking no for an answer. But it was the familiarity that made Hisoka so curious to follow it. He knew that piece of music, though now it felt like something he had heard in a dream. Or another lifetime.

He followed the music to a school auditorium, and slipped inside. A crowd had gathered for a late night concert, a small chamber orchestra playing a piece that Hisoka remembered. More like he couldn't forget.

He couldn't forget that face, either, though it had been nearly six years since he last saw it. Time enough for things to change. The solo violinist was taller than the last time they met, and the two of them no longer looked so uncannily alike; but there was enough there for Hisoka to wonder if this was what he would have looked like himself if he'd lived beyond his sixteen years.

Minase Hijiri.

And playing the Devil's Trill, sounding better than ever. With the specter of the shoggoth still looming over Hisoka's mind, the piece washed over him like a vague premonition, though not nearly as ominous as it once was. Like Hijiri had said himself about the piece: Underneath the darkness of the story, there was a hope, a very human sense of peace and optimism by the music's close. This time, the demon was already exorcised; there should have been nothing to mar Hisoka's appreciation of the music in its pure form.

But he couldn't be sure if this peace was genuine, and not only the beginning. The moment of stillness between the first slight rumblings and the moment the land gave way beneath their feet.

He watched, rapt, as the number came to a close, and the players bowed to the audience's applause. Hijiri beamed—that was one expression they would never share in common—and then started, just slightly, as his eyes alit on Hisoka.

He recognized him instantly. But then again, how could he not?

* * *

"You haven't changed a bit," he said a little later, after the show, when the two had found one another.

It hadn't been Hisoka's original intent to approach Hijiri—something about shinigami limiting their contact with the living unless they were part of the case—but his own curiosity led him around the side entrance, where it turned out Hijiri had been looking for him all along.

"And you've . . . grown up," Hisoka said. There was no other way to put it. "You look good."

He meant in the sense that Hijiri seemed to be in good spirits and health, no devils after him for blood now; but he had turned into a handsome young man as well, with poise and confidence that suited him well on stage. For a brief moment, Hisoka envied him for it. "What brings you to Fukuoka?"

"Just touring with some university friends of mine, doing the high school circuit, trying to get kids interested in classical music. We met through a Baroque music club, if you can believe that luck. What are the odds, huh?"

Yeah. What were the odds? That thought was on Hisoka's mind as well. What were the odds of meeting someone from a past case like Hijiri's on the same night, in the same city as a rampant ancient monster?

"So, what are you doing here?" Hijiri seemed to have read his mind. "This a courtesy call, or . . . I'm not on anyone else's shit list, am I?"

"Not ours. I think I would know if you were. So you can rest easy about that." Whether he was on Hell's was another matter, but as long as Hisoka knew nothing, he wasn't about to bring it up. "Just a case. Nothing to do with you or your club, though. Big slime mold loose in the subway, but we cleaned it up."

"Oh," Hijiri said, but Hisoka could see it going right over his head. Which was just as well. The less he concerned himself with the matters of the dead, the better. He looked over Hisoka's shoulder. "Is Tsuzuki around?"

Hisoka's heart sank. It would come down to that, wouldn't it? It wasn't him Hijiri had felt close to while the two of them were on his case. But what was Hisoka supposed to tell him? He had to deal with Tsuzuki's disappearance on his own; discussing it with Hijiri, making him worry, fielding the questions Hisoka had already asked a hundred times, wasn't going to bring Tsuzuki back any faster. "He, ah, didn't come with me—"

"Hijiri? You ready to hit the road?"

Hisoka couldn't say he didn't welcome the interruption. Hijiri turned as another young man came to join them: about the same age, wearing the same jacket and tie—though his a little undone—a half-smoked cigarette between his fingers.

Hijiri grinned when he saw him. "Just about. Come on over here, there's someone I want to introduce you to." He turned back to Hisoka, eyes alive as he said to the other, "This is Kurosaki. He saved my life six years ago. Hisoka, meet Yamada. Our brilliant harpsichordist."

"Six years." Yamada chuckled, though not in any mocking sort of way. "Wouldn't that make you . . . what? Eight back then?"

Hijiri started, having forgotten, but Hisoka was quick to offer a cover. "Ten, actually. I'm older than I look."

He caught Hijiri stifling a laugh out of the corner of his eye. Well, the last part was hardly a lie.

"Well, in that case," the other musician said, "I owe you a debt of gratitude." He extended his hand to Hisoka, who took it after a moment's hesitation. There was nothing at all threatening coming down through Yamada's touch, much to Hisoka's relief, and his gratitude was definitely genuine, much more so than his casual, somewhat aloof manner would make it seem. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Kurosaki. Hijiri, I'll see you in the van?"

As he walked away, Hisoka noticed a bit of a flush to Hijiri's cheeks. "Nice guy. I'm glad to see you've made some good friends since the whole . . . Well, since the case."

"Well, Yamada's a little more than just a friend. . . ."

Not sure if he'd caught Hijiri's meaning right, Hisoka blinked. And Hijiri blushed deeper, as if he couldn't believe he'd actually said that himself. "Don't look at me like it's such a shock. You had to have some idea back then—"

"Actually, I hadn't given it any thought." The way Hisoka remembered it, he'd been too busy fighting off the advances of a devil in Tsuzuki's body to worry about Hijiri's take on the matter.

So, did that mean Hijiri had had a crush on Tsuzuki while the case was going on? Or had that only come later, a revelation reached in college? Was he with this Yamada guy because of something that reminded Hijiri of Tsuzuki?

And why was it any of Hisoka's business? He never showed any interest in these kinds of matters before. It was just . . . with Tsuzuki gone . . .

"Sorry, I've really gotta run. But it was great running into you, Hisoka. Really."

Hisoka snapped back to the present to have a card pressed into his hand. It was for the Baroque club, their name in fancy scrawl with plain-type e-mail address below it. "When you guys have some free time between cases, look me up, okay? I can catch you up on everything that's happened since you helped me. And of course, I want to hear what the two of you have been up to in the meantime, too."

"Oh—of course," was all Hisoka could say. Where to start—with Muraki's grand plans and the fire in Kyoto, Tsuzuki's various attempts at self-destruction and Hisoka's continued battle with his memories?

"I mean, if that sort of thing is allowed, that is. Tell Tsuzuki I send my best regards."

Hisoka told him he would—if not in so many words—and with a wave, Hijiri was gone.

Leaving Hisoka in the dark, empty school yard, alone with the first blooming plums and Hijiri's last words to him. Give Tsuzuki his best, huh? Hisoka would if he could. If he only knew where Tsuzuki _was_.


	2. A book of holy things

"Explain again what I'm doing here."

Checking the circle he had drawn over the courtyard tiles—this time, if anything did go wrong, he could say it was not from any flaws on his end—Hisoka looked up at a less than happy-to-be-there Watari, his arms folded over his lab coat, a curious 003 hovering over his shoulder.

"Sorry to pull you away from your lab," Hisoka said. "I'm sure whatever you were working on was fascinating, but we thought it might be best if we had an extra pair of hands for this. Someone with some experience identifying supernatural beings."

"And a witness," Natsume added with a perverse grin. Which made Hisoka shake his head in exasperation. If there was one thing his new partner lacked it was tact—which actually made him resemble even more the last one. "You know, just in case something goes horribly wrong and we all get burnt to a crisp."

Watari backed up a step, but not because of anything Natsume had said. "The hell is _that?_"

A natural question to ask, seeing how the young man, dressed in suit and tie, was holding the containment box out in front of him by its cord with a double layer of oven gloves, and it still steamed and hissed and generally threatened to give anything that came in contact with it a case of freezer burn to rival the surface of Pluto.

"What, this?" Natsume said as nonchalant as could be. "Just some old junk I found in the basement. I thought maybe _you_ might recognize it."

"Do I?" To Hisoka's surprise, Watari brightened with boyish excitement. "If I'm not mistaken, that's my very own invention. Haven't seen it in _years_—not since I had my own 'miracle' period, I wanna say around eighty-five, eighty-six perhaps."

"I believe you were working on the Mother Project at the time," Natsume agreed. "Some of your finest work came out of that period."

"For all that's worth now. I do remember this little fella, though. I called it Xul. But I thought it might have dropped out of Meifu altogether or wound up at the bottom of the lake of fire."

The way Watari stared at the device, one would think he was meeting an old friend believed long dead. At least he didn't try to hug it. He explained to Hisoka: "If I remember right, I made it to capture supernatural entities within pocket universes, by way of a small anti-matter implosion, thus containing them in their own separate dimension until they could be safely interrogated, sent on for judgment, or exorcised, depending on the ghouly in question."

"Wait a second," said Hisoka. "Are you saying the toaster _creates_ universes?"

"Don't look so surprised, Bon. Any fool with two particles to rub together can create his own universe. Locating universes you've already made—now _that _takes some skill. And a healthy dose of luck, I might add. But that was all theoretical." Watari turned back to Natsume. "I never actually got the damn thing to _work. _Not to mention, you had to feed it more anti-matter every time you wanted to use it. Not the most practical thing I've come up with."

"Ah, but you provided the framework, Sensei," said Natsume. "The technology just had to catch up."

"Could we possibly discuss what's _inside_ the box?" Hisoka said. Never mind the question of when or why his partner had started calling Watari "sensei". "That's the other reason I wanted you here, Watari. After all, you were so helpful on the Surgatanus case—"

The scientist's smile fell. "It's another demon, isn't it? Wonderful. Well, at least we have someone from Billing already here when the cafeteria explodes."

Natsume just chuckled at that. "Not a demon. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. Let's just say it's more on the order of giant paleozoic protoplasmic lifeforms. . . ."

"You can't mean—"

"Yes."

"Shoggoths?"

"Yes!"

"Amazing. I always suspected they existed, but . . . Wow! To think. And captured by my own machine? I am a genius."

"That's what I keep telling you, Sensei."

There was still one thing Hisoka didn't quite get. "If these shoggoth things are really something to shout about, then how come I've never come across a single mention of them in all the literature?"

"Must be reading the wrong kind of literature."

"Ever read 'At the Mountains of Madness,' Bon? No? Well, it's high time you started! It will scare the stuffing out of you."

"It's a classic." Natsume nodded sagely.

"You've probably never heard of them because 'shoggoth' is a modern name given to them by the great American demon hunter and psychic, Howard Phillips. You'd know 'em in the old myths as Tiamat, Apophis, Leviathan—re-imagined by ancient people familiar with dragons and snake gods as giant sea serpents who ate everything in sight. So they had to be culled and sealed away. Or else put to work, controlled and enslaved, by the gods."

"Why not destroy them all," said Hisoka, "if they're so dangerous?"

"I don't know. Easier said than done? Either that or the gods didn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth. Or, I guess, slaughter a gift horse, in this analogy. . . .

"But that summoning circle you wrote should hold it long enough for our purposes," Watari assured him. "And if for some reason _that _fails, this courtyard is equipped with security features designed to stun even a rampaging demon long enough to hit it back. I'll give Buildings and Grounds one thing, they have learned some valuable lessons from Tsuzuki's little shikigami mishaps."

"Great." None of this was doing anything to put Hisoka at ease. Just putting off the inevitable. "So, can we get on with opening that thing up so you guys can study your precious slime monster and I can get back to real work?"

"Okay, okay, Bon, jeez," said Watari, as he steeled himself for the big reveal. Natsume grinned creepily at him. "Sorry if there's some things I just don't wanna rush. And this next stepwill have to be performed very delicately. . . ."

So saying, he thumbed the switch on the remote trigger Natsume had given him. There was a loud, cracking pop and another arc of violet lightning jumped between the box and the summoning circle, not unlike a CD placed in the microwave. Hisoka and Natsume jumped as well, back a few steps.

"Huh," Watari said, staring. "I know I never got it to work right, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't supposed to do _that_."

Instead of the gushing slime mold they had been expecting, all that remained was the containment unit, lying open on the courtyard tiles in the middle of Hisoka's circle, emitting a stream of smoke and a foul odor, and a very sad, high-pitched whine. Ignoring any safety concerns whatsoever, Natsume hurried over.

The crestfallen expression on his face was not encouraging. "What happened!" Watari yelled over his popped eardrums.

"Looks like Xul vaporized our shoggoth." Natsume coughed, fanning the air in front of his face. "Phew! That baby sure packs a punch."

"Alright. I guess they're not that hard to kill after all. Must have a malfunctioning circuit or something—"

"Or the intense heat and pressure of being sucked up and spit back out of a miniature Big Bang?" Hisoka suggested, to Watari's amazed blink. "What? Just because I missed out on junior high and died didn't mean I stopped learning."

"Obviously there are still some bugs to work out," Watari agreed. "A fatal flaw somewhere between catch and release. Literally. But at least we know it does one thing good."

"Yeah. If I ever run into another slime monster, I know who I'm gonna call."

Watari enjoyed a good chuckle at that. "You don't even know why that's funny, do you, Bon?"

"Why what's funny?"

They joined Natsume beside the box just as he was pulling out a bit of sticky, charred black goo with the end of his fountain pen. "You were saying about toast?" he joked to Hisoka.

Watari put his hands on his hips and huffed. "Well, that was a disappointing wash. I'll take the, er, remains back to my office and see if I can make anything of it."

"You were really excited about meeting your first shoggoth, weren't you?" said Hisoka.

"You bet your bottom dollar."

"And now it's a smoking box of garbage. I'm sorry, Watari. I was hoping maybe it would have something to tell us, like what it was doing in Fukuoka in the first place, but I guess the main thing is it won't be doing that city or its residents any more harm."

"True, true. Blob monsters aren't exactly known for their eloquence, either, Bon. But who knows. There might be some useful, recoverable information in, ah, whatever I can scrape outta the container. . . ."

While they were talking, Natsume's cellphone buzzed and played a ringtone version of the _Ghostbusters _theme song. Goo-tipped pen in one hand, he flipped the phone open with the other, cradled it between shoulder and ear while he finagled the pen into a plastic baggie, said, "Natsume. Yeah. . . . Uh-huh. . . . I'll tell him," and zipped the bag and snapped the phone shut.

"That was Tatsumi," he told the others. And Hisoka specifically: "He wants to speak with us."

Dread and hope surged all at once in an icy torrent through Hisoka's veins. His dead heart skipped a beat and started back up at double speed. But all he could manage was a breathless "Yeah?"

"He wouldn't say what about over the phone." They all to be more careful of late, ever since Tatsumi had found the first bug in Konoe's office. There was no telling what or whom Peacekeeping had tapped in their search for Tsuzuki. "Looks like I've got to steal Kurosaki away from you, Sensei. Can we leave you to clean up?"

"Oh, sure. Story of my life." But Watari's wink cut through the light sarcasm. "I just hope it's good news. For once."

* * *

"I've received an update," Tatsumi told them when they were all assembled in the chief's office.

Hisoka and Natsume, Terazuma and Wakaba stood around the small, comfortably furnished room, too antsy to sit down.

The office was swept for bugs by the Gushoushin at least once a day now, and Tatsumi himself hardly left during work hours, including, despite the extra cost, ordering his lunches brought in and eating at Konoe's desk. It might have been a lonely existence, keeping such close vigil, for anyone other than Tatsumi, who was used to working long after everyone else had gone home, not content to turn off the lights until every case report and receipt was properly filed away.

Nor was his paranoia in the least unfounded. It never ceased to amaze Summons what lengths the increasingly ironically named Peacekeeping Division would go to to keep tabs on them. All manner of spell-enhanced electronic bugs and listening dolls, eavesdropping and scrying fuda wedged between the pages of reference books or pasted at the bottom of decorative pots. As a precaution, Tatsumi had had all the plants and extraneous pieces of decoration removed for the time being; and a triple-layered privacy shield erected within the walls allowed sound from the workplace beyond to penetrate, but muffled almost any noise that issued from inside.

Still, they had all agreed it was wise as a general policy to watch what they said at all times. So there was no need to acknowledge that such updates came from their contacts in Peacekeeping, namely agents Kazuma and Nonomiya, who had been sympathetic to Tsuzuki and his coworkers for some time. And trying their best to find him on behalf of Summons before the rest of their own department.

The latter scenario was what Hisoka dreaded most. It was what haunted his dreams—what little sleep he did get these days—and made his pulse race every time they were called in for one of these "updates." It was what prompted him to ask outright, "Did they find him?"

"No," Tatsumi said, eliciting a collective breath of relief. "That's the news I wanted to share with you."

"Well," Wakaba agreed, "no news is good news, I guess. At least in this concern."

Nobody wanted to be the one to add a "yet" to the conversation. As long as Peacekeeping did not have Tsuzuki in custody, the better their chances of finding him themselves, though a slim chance it was that even that would save him from Enma's wrath. But each day that went by with a draw for both sides, and Summons so clearly outmatched in terms of agents in the field. . . .

"I don't want to be the one to burst the bubble, but how do we know we can still trust the information we're getting?" said Terazuma. "We've been hearing the exact same thing for five months now. How do we know the other end hasn't been compromised?"

Tatsumi blinked. "I suppose the truth is we don't. We have to take it on faith that if Enma's forces had Tsuzuki, we'd know."

By the scowl on his face, the tight fold of his arms across his chest, it seemed Terazuma wasn't quite buying it. "Sorry, but I don't think we can rule out the possibility that Peacekeeping has organized a campaign of misinformation against us. You guys weren't on the force in the living world. You don't know how this spy stuff works. While we sit on our hands, going about our investigations like nothing has changed, Peacekeeping can and has done whatever they want to us—and so far, we've done nothing but lie back and let them."

"Are you suggesting we should start _spying _on our own security forces, Terazuma?"

"Well, it wouldn't hurt." At Natsume's sigh and eye roll, Terazuma turned on him. "And I still don't see what _he_'s doing here," he said to Tatsumi. "How can we be sure he really has Tsuzuki's best interest at heart—or this department's, for that matter?"

"You're forgetting I was his partner too," the young man in question answered for himself. "I was a Summons agent before you even knew what a shinigami was. _And_, if I remember right, during your brief partnership with him, Tsuzuki really messed you up. Something about taking you to Gensoukai way before you were ready."

A warning growl from Terazuma's direction, though Hisoka doubted he would do anything to make a scene in front of his other coworkers. The shikigami inside him, however, one could never be too sure about.

"I'd be more worried about _your _loyalties," Natsume went on fearlessly, stepping closer to the former detective. "You haven't exactly been shy making your distaste for Tsuzuki known publicly in the past."

If Hisoka was taken aback by anything, it was how dark Terazuma's complexion turned at the accusation. Maybe his new partner didn't see it yet—having been transferred before ever knowing Terazuma—but it was quite clear to an empath how protective Terazuma had grown in the last several months toward his former partner and self-ascribed rival. If Peacekeeping did manage to bring Tsuzuki in first, Hisoka feared what the Black Lion might do to their department in compensation. Tsuzuki wouldn't be the only friend he would lose if that day ever came.

"That's enough," Tatsumi said before Terazuma could do more than open his mouth. His words, evenly delivered, were nonetheless quite enough to calm the bickering between the two. "I have good reason for trusting you both, but I can't have schisms within this team threatening to tear it apart. Whatever differences you two _imagine _you might have, you need to put them aside at once."

"Or what?" Terazuma scoffed.

But a disappointed look from Tatsumi was all it took to make him drop his gaze in regret for his immaturity.

"Kurosaki." Their interim chief turned to Hisoka. "Have you had any progress whatsoever?"

It had been a few months since the two had decided to try and use Hisoka's empathic abilities to locate Tsuzuki. The theory was, with the connection the two of them shared, forged by the trauma they had been through together and the deep trust that Tsuzuki had never exhibited toward any other partner, there might be a way to tap into Tsuzuki's spiritual signature and home in on his location. Like tracing a phone call or IP address.

But Hisoka feared he might have started too late to catch Tsuzuki's scent, so to speak. Not to mention, if Tsuzuki was smart, he would have made doubly sure to hide his spiritual signature behind a cloaking or distortion barrier. Truth be told, Hisoka believed that was the only reason the Peacekeeping Division had yet to find any clue as to Tsuzuki's whereabouts after five months of extensive searching. There were probably many agents on the force who had expected their quarry to be clumsy or careless enough to get caught within the first week. Hisoka could take pleasure in the thought of what pride had suffered as a result.

He shook his head. "Nothing. But I feel like I can say for certain at this point that Tsuzuki is not in Kyushu."

"But you think he's still out there somewhere?"

"I don't think he's offed himself, if that's what you mean. But I have no proof of that." Nor had he the faintest clue what Muraki had said or done to him to make Tsuzuki take off like he did. It had to be bad, of course, but so bad Tsuzuki couldn't even trust the person who had brought him back from the brink of self-destruction enough to confide in?

Seeming to guess his train of thought, Tatsumi excused them, but begged Hisoka stay behind with a light hand on his shoulder.

When the door was securely closed behind him again, Tatsumi let out what he had been holding back: "That isn't the only news I received today."

"Well?" Following Tatsumi back to the desk, Hisoka's flesh practically tingled with anxious curiosity. "What is it?"

"It's about Konoe. It doesn't look like he'll be coming back any time soon."

Hisoka could only stare as the other sat slowly in the chief's chair, the implications taking their time sinking in. "Then that makes you . . ."

"No longer _interim _chief, I suppose. The announcement hasn't been made officially yet, but Chief Konoe's reassignment is, as of this morning, public knowledge. Even if they're keeping the nature of this project he's working on tightly under wraps." He gazed into space, lost in thought, and Hisoka could see the muscles tensing in his jaw. "What really gets me is that I had to hear about it in a congratulatory e-mail. From Todoroki."

"The Peacekeeping Division chief?"

"None other." A bitter smile marred Tatsumi's face. "I don't even care how he heard the news first. I suppose I should just be grateful that means they're not going to demote me. Perhaps with Enma-cho so strongly divided over the Tsuzuki affair, our good king's men thought it best not to ruffle any more feathers assigning someone from outside the department as the new head of Summons. They need us to keep order between the living and the dead, after all."

"Right. Piss off enough of us and they might just have the living dead to deal with."

Neither of them felt much like smiling, however, whether or not it had actually been meant as a joke. "They must think they can control me more easily if they keep me where I am," Tatsumi said as much to himself as to Hisoka. "And they would be partly right. But that control works both ways. In any case, I've kept you long enough, Kurosaki. Finding Tsuzuki remains our primary mission, but we must not let it interfere with carrying out our duty to the living. And we mustn't forget Dr. Muraki is still out there somewhere."

Hisoka turned to go, but one nagging thought stopped him before he could get too far. "Tatsumi? I was wondering . . ."

The new Summons chief looked up from his computer screen. "Yes?"

It had occurred to Hisoka before, in the days after Tsuzuki went missing and at other moments since, but he had always chickened out of asking, or convinced himself it was none of his business. But now, with their own investigation having come to so many dead ends, was it wise, or even courteous, to keep putting it off?

"Well, I was just wondering if Tsuzuki said anything to you. Right before he disappeared. I mean, if he said anything at all that might help us decide what to do or where to focus our efforts next."

"No. Nothing." The answer came promptly while Tatsumi held his gaze. "I only wish he had."

* * *

Tatsumi didn't breathe easy again until the door latch caught behind Hisoka, cutting him off from the noise of the office space beyond. It was no walk in the park, keeping secrets from an empath, let alone lying to one's face, and every time he did so he feared Kurosaki would see through his lies like they were wet rice paper.

"He said I was his father,"Tsuzuki had confided in him the night he had come back from meeting with Muraki, right outside these walls. "He said we have the same DNA, and this piece of paper is supposed to prove it."

Tatsumi never got a good look at the print-out in question, already torn into pieces and taped back together. Nor could he say either he or Tsuzuki would have been able to make sense of the information on it.

But he remembered it lying there, a sad, bedraggled thing, subjected to all Tsuzuki's rage and disbelief and, finally, remorse. He remembered the way Tsuzuki's voice cracked around the words, the self-loathing and guilt in them that he could feel like noxious vapors working their way down into his lungs, choking him like the scent of whiskey on Tsuzuki's breath, and all he had been able to say in response was "Why are you telling me this? Have you been drinking?"

Not "Don't listen to him," "He's lying to you," "You're not that monster's father". . . . Somehow those words had not crossed his mind, as though he had accepted the truth as common sense as soon as it was out of Tsuzuki's mouth.

If he had said anything else, if he had denied all Tsuzuki's fears about Enma's machinations and his own damned legacy, willing or unwilling. . . .

Would any of it have made a difference? Tatsumi really couldn't say.

Nor was he so sure he was making the right decision now, keeping quiet. But Tsuzuki had all but made him swear not to tell Kurosaki. "If you were Hisoka, and you went through what he did, is that something you would want to hear? That the person you're supposed to trust most was responsible for everything that went wrong in your life?"

Tatsumi had insisted then that it was none of his business. It wasn't his decision to make, whether Kurosaki knew or not. But wouldn't he want to know himself, if he were in Kurosaki's place?

He ground his teeth for what felt like the thousandth time that day, noticing that his jaw was beginning to ache. The fact remained: A proper chief would know what to do in a situation like this, and Tatsumi was coming up blank.

* * *

The globe of light bobbed along ahead of him and disappeared.

Plunged into darkness, Konoe stopped to take a break. As if it wasn't enough that his back was starting to nag him all over again, and his night vision had begun to go when he died. He opened his mouth to call out to his guide—

When the paper lantern came floating back into view, the little creature holding it high over its head huffing and bubbling as he came back to Konoe's side. Wide feet flapped against the old masonry, and before long two bulging eyes in a chelonian face stared up out of the lantern's glow at him.

Satisfied there seemed nothing amiss with Konoe, it harrumphed, and said, "Well? Come on. Keep up."

"In a second. Give an old man a moment to catch his breath." Konoe squinted into the darkness up ahead, but could make out nothing. "Just how far is this place we're going to?"

"Not far." The kappa squeaked out his words in quick little bursts. "Close now. Hop to."

He turned with a bit of a hop himself, and waddled back down the hall, albeit at a pace Konoe could follow. Not that he was having as much difficulty as he let on; but the longer his guide thought he needed special treatment, the longer Konoe was able to study his surroundings. Surroundings he was fairly certain the powers that be wanted to remain mysterious to him, lest he be able to find his way back at a time of his own choosing.

The kappa led him to a padlocked door and withdrew an obscenely large key ring from inside his yukata. Five turns of five different keys later and the heavy wooden door creaked slowly open under the little creature's push. He reached up on tiptoes for the light switch on the wall, and sconces of frosted glass shaped like flowers gradually warmed to a soft orange glow around the room.

Konoe coughed into his handkerchief at the first assailing whiff of dust. The chamber the kappa led him into looked as though it had hardly been touched since the room was wired for electricity—by his best guess, at least eighty years ago. It might have been comfortable once, but in the nearly a century since had been demoted to a store room. By Konoe's estimates—the condensation in the slightly stale air, the twists and turns of the trip here and the pressure changes in his inner ear—he judged them to be underground. But just how deep and under what part of Juuohcho, there were no clues he could immediately discern.

The kappa meandered over to the room's main piece of furniture, an old wooden desk, dry and cracked with age, stained with India ink and old candle wax. Setting his lantern down, he lit an oil lamp, and adjusted its brightness to what Konoe could only assume was quite satisfactory for kappa. Still, in its dim glow, he could easily make out the stacks—no, towers of case files piled on the desk top.

"So," Konoe grumbled to the little creature, "this is my new office."

"You will remain here every day from eight in the morning to six in the evening," the kappa recited his lines. "There will be breaks for meals, which will be delivered to you and eaten here, twice a day. Liquid refreshments will be provided on an as-needed basis."

"No bathroom breaks?"

If the kappa noticed his sarcasm, he didn't let on. Those bulging eyes fixed unblinking on Konoe, like two silver coins in the low light. "His Esteemed Augustness wished you to have no distractions from your work. You and the materials will be secured in this room until your time is deemed fulfilled."

"You mean locked in." So, this is how Enma repays me for my cooperation, he thought: with a prison cell. He moved to the desk and took the top few files from the closest stack. A cursory look inside each one revealed two common denominators: They were all classified Top Secret. And they all included the name Muraki Yukitaka.

But then, this was hardly a surprise. The magnanimous King Enma knew just where to twist the dagger into each of his loyal subjects for maximum effect.

As if thinking just that, the kappa grinned at him, revealing razor-sharp teeth beneath his fleshy beak. An even more disturbing sight in the lamp light than Konoe would have imagined, and all the reminder he needed that, diminutive though they were, they were a vicious people. And still carried a grudge over being replaced in Enma's bureaucracy by human souls, and relegated to these shadow realms. "Shinigami must all pay for their sins eventually," Konoe's captor sibilated with more relish than necessary.

"And Lord Enma will let me out of this janitor's closet when I find something useful?"

"You tell me when you find something useful. _I_ tell Lord Enma."

Konoe sighed. Obviously a different kind of bureaucracy applied here. He would have to get used to it, learn to respect and play it, if he didn't want to eat raw liver and cucumber twice a day for the foreseeable future. "I'd better get to it, then." Anything to not have those Smeagol-esque eyes watching his every move. "Think His Augustness might be able to spare an electric table lamp? It will make my work go faster."

The kappa made a sound between his gums and the corner of his lips that might have been either laughter or reluctant acquiescence. Konoe couldn't tell. In any case, it worked, and his captor departed, each lock turning closed behind him with a heavy finality.

Konoe rubbed his hands together and surveyed the room. Well, at least he wouldn't freeze. Or die of boredom. He opened the damper a bit on the oil lamp so he could set right to work, but as the room brightened, his spirits fell.

It wasn't just the desk the files were piled on. There were stacks leaning against the legs of the desk as well, and stacks perched on chairs. Boxes full to the point of bulging made precarious towers against the walls, some of which stood taller than he did. "My, Yukitaka," Konoe cursed under his breath, "you were a busy man."

He was going to be here a while.

He only hoped that, wherever Tsuzuki was at the moment, it was worth it.

* * *

"Thank you, come again. Get home safe."

Tsuzuki bowed as the last of that night's customers ambled out of the izakaya. One gentleman who had had a bit more to drink cracked a joke, and though Tsuzuki only understood half of it, he laughed along anyway, and returned the man's wave.

He had the shochu warm and ready by the time Mr. Saito turned off the sign and came back in. One glass for his boss, one for himself. "Ah. _Kampai_," the old man said in thanks, and took a generous swallow.

It was past two in the morning. The trains had stopped for the night some time before, and the streets were quiet, mostly local insomniacs and shopkeeps like themselves out and about at this hour.

It was the time Tsuzuki liked best, when the cover of night seemed to stifle his darker thoughts beneath its weight and he felt the most freed from the shackles of self. It helped to have work to do, to keep his hands busy and customers satisfied, mixing drinks or pouring beer and sake while Saito worked the grill, busing tables and waving hungry, sleep-deprived faces into the cramped little alleyway restaurant.

His employer, an old resident Korean, had given up asking Tsuzuki if he minded working into the wee hours of morning. He was happy for the help, especially with the heavy lifting, and doubly grateful for a hard worker with such an outgoing personality as Tsuzuki.

"It hasn't been easy, keeping this business going all these years," he had admitted to Tsuzuki once while they restocked the bar for the night.

Tsuzuki had blinked up at Saito, setting the bin of beer bottles down with a rattle. "I find that hard to believe. Your clientele seems to include a lot of regulars. And I've heard more than a few drunken professions of love aimed your way. Although that might just have been meant for the prime rib."

"I suppose that's true," Saito laughed. "Now. But it wasn't always smooth sailing. When I first started, a lot of people were reluctant to patronize a place run by a _zainichi_. Even in the big city."

If that was his roundabout way of asking Tsuzuki why he was so dedicated to this place, when there wasn't much of a future to look forward to in it for one apparently so young, Tsuzuki wasn't about to give him the satisfaction. The shinigami just smiled. "I guess some things never change, huh? When I was young, it was the _eta_ no one trusted." And me, he thought, but for a different reason entirely that he really needn't trouble his employer with.

He hadn't realized until after he said it that the word he'd used for the untouchable class dated him immensely. But Saito seemed to take it a different way: It was one more thing they had in common. They were both used to being treated as outcasts, and for what they were simply born to be. It was one more reason they belonged there together, working the same tiny izakaya in the dead hours of night.

Now, with another day's work behind him and the shochu warming his lips, Saito said, "You can take a night off now and then, you know. I can't imagine your girlfriend's crazy about you spending seven nights a week in this dump."

Tsuzuki had to laugh. The old man wasn't exactly subtle. Though Tsuzuki couldn't blame him, either: He rarely talked about himself, and even then only in vague terms that would give no indication of his being a shinigami, or the fact that he had been dead for over seventy-five years.

"There is no girlfriend," he said.

"Seriously? Charming young fellow like yourself? No." Saito waved a finger at him. "You're awful quiet about your personal life, but if there's one thing I can tell, it's when someone's got it bad for someone else. Though, I suppose these days I might as well ask if there's a boyfriend."

He was teasing now, but it didn't sit well with Tsuzuki how close he came to a truth he'd rather remained hidden. "I'm staying with someone," he said instead, "a friend, until I can get things sorted out. She kind of works long hours, and I don't want to intrude when she gets home—"

"Ah," Saito said knowingly, and that or the shochu made Tsuzuki blush.

"There's really nothing going on. Not like you're suggesting. It's just better if I'm . . . not there."

Whether he believed Tsuzuki's answer or not, Saito let that one slide. They spoke of other things as they finished cleaning up, and parted ways close to three o'clock with warm well-wishes through their yawns.

It was a quiet area where Mr. Saito had set up shop, a residential neighborhood in Tokyo where single-family houses still peeked over the tops of stucco walls, and the shops and restaurants evoked a small-town feel that had hardly changed in fifty years, even if the cost of living there had gradually gone up. At least, in the earliest hours of the morning, Tsuzuki could catches glimpses of the Tokyo of his youth. In the golden glow of a streetlamp, the electric lines overhead and minivans and coupes sleeping on street corners occupied the same time and place as cobblestones put down in the Taisho era and Showa railroad tracks. Nearly a century had passed since he walked the streets of this city as a child, but the overall air of Tokyo had not changed all that much to him, through boom and bust and war.

Or maybe he was just feeling nostalgic. Seven decades spent chasing ghosts and demons all over Kyushu with only the occasional visit for a coffee and donut had made him miss the bustle and certain spirit of communal existence to which no other big city could quite compare, even here in one of its many bedroom communities. There was something about hearing that clear Tokyo accent that made him feel like he was home after a long time abroad.

And the rose garden that awaited him inside Sakuraiji Ukyou's private gate, the sweet-musk scent that assailed him even in this chilly late winter night's air, was as welcoming as an _okaeri _shouted from inside.

Tsuzuki exercised extreme care unlocking and opening the front door. He removed his shoes and coat in the entryway as silently as he could manage, and tread on cat-like feet to the kitchen for a glass of water before bed. It would only be a few hours before Ukyou awoke and made herself ready for the office; the worst sin Tsuzuki could think of right now would be to deprive her of what little sleep she got.

Yet he couldn't help stopping by her door on the way to the spare bedroom—it _was _on the way, after all—and pushing the sliding door open the tiniest crack. Just to make sure she had made it home safely, he assured himself, even as he took the opportunity to study her sleeping face, her youthful brow unmarred by concerns of the day. Measure her breaths by the rise and fall of her form beneath the quilt.

It was not something he could explain to Mr. Saito—or anyone else for that matter—how he had come to stay here in the house of his enemy's fiancee. Rather, he should say, the fiancee and confidante of the man whom—if Muraki was to be believed—he had unknowingly sired after his own death, the man whose existence was the reason for all of this complicated mess, and whom he had come here trying to find in the hopes that, somehow, there might be a way he could begin to undo some of the damage.

And why after five months with nothing to show for his search she had yet to kick him out . . . that was something even Tsuzuki could not understand.

* * *

**Edit:** Thank you, Literary Eagle, for catching my mistakes. orz (How did you know I didn't mean it to smell like chicken?) Corrections made.


	3. They'll throw you up against the wall

"_You say you're a relative of Kazutaka's?"_

"_A distant one, yes. On his mother's side."_

_Seated halfway back on the sofa's center cushion, Tsuzuki accepted the saucer and cup of tea Ukyou offered him graciously. In fact, everything he did since entering her home had been with an air of gratitude. Even his trench coat hanging on its hook by the door seemed to do so in the least obtrusive manner possible for an inanimate object._

"_That would explain why I never heard of you before," Ukyou said as she took a seat opposite him, folding her hands one within the other in her lap. "The Murakis seemed reluctant to make any mention of her family, the way I remember it."_

_Tsuzuki glanced around the two-story house as he sipped from the plain white cup. Even knowing next to nothing about Sakuraiji Ukyou, he could see that she did very well for herself, possessing either a career or inheritance that allowed her to furnish her relatively large Tokyo home with high-quality modern pieces. There were very few patterns, those relegated to the artwork on the walls—artistically out-of-focus color photography and a few obscure paintings—and her own simple autumn skirt._

_Ukyou herself seemed like a lonely child surrounded by these adult tastes—though he supposed that was only a matter of perception. Though she may have passed for a high school student still, with her petite frame, her wide eyes and unlined complexion, Ukyou could not have been much younger than Muraki himself, which put her in her late-thirties. Her seemingly innocent face and unassuming manners masked a sharp intellect, too, which Tsuzuki could see begin to come out in fits and starts, like a hermit crab cautiously poking out of its shell, not wanting to reveal itself for what it was too soon._

"_Did you ever meet his mother?" he asked._

"_Once or twice. I'm sure you know by now that she was diagnosed as clinically insane not long after he was born. But to me she always just seemed very sad."_

"_I'm sorry to hear it."_

"_And is that how you came to learn about Kazutaka? Through his mother?"_

_In a manner of speaking, but Tsuzuki still could barely find the words to explain it to himself, let alone this woman he had only just met. And whom he was trying very hard not to frighten. "He contacted me, actually," Tsuzuki said, weighing his words. "About five years ago. It was sort of an accident. I had no idea what kind of invitation I was answering."_

Following the wraith Maria Wong had become to the steps of that church in Nagasaki . . . Something pulling him onward, inward . . . Like a sense of deja vu he had found impossible to resist. . . .

_Muraki had shed a tear of disbelief when he saw Tsuzuki standing in the flesh before him, though it had taken Tsuzuki much longer to understand all the nuanced reasons why._ _"I guess you might say we've become . . . close since then."_

_Ukyou's sympathetic smile seemed almost conciliatory. "Which is how you came to know about me."_

"_As his fiancee and oldest friend, you know a side of him that no one else does," Tsuzuki agreed. "I'm sorry to spring this on you out of the blue, but I was hoping you might know something that would help me find him. Other places of business or friendly acquaintances who might be able to get a word through. . . ."_

_The smile wavered, but held. "I don't know how much I can help you, Mr. . . . Tsuzuki, you said your name was? I'm sorry you had to find out this way, but Kazutaka has been dead going on three years now."_

"_But he isn't. That's the thing."_

_Ukyou's smile finally fell then. Something flashed across her eyes and they lost focus of Tsuzuki. Thoughts raced through her mind that he wished he was privy to, but all he could say was, "_I'm_ sorry. I know that must come as a shock when you've no doubt already been through the whole mourning process. It isn't the best way to tell you, but I didn't know any other way than to just come out and say it."_

_Silently, Ukyou stood. As though on numb legs, she turned and walked back to the kitchen. _

_Now he had really stepped in it, Tsuzuki thought. Perhaps in the back of his mind he had assumed that Sakuraiji would take news of her fiance's life a little better than this. Then again, if she had half a clue as to what Muraki was, and what he had done, maybe she had been relieved to think him dead. And Tsuzuki would not have been able to say he blamed her. _

_When she returned a moment later with a pistol leveled at him, however, Tsuzuki knew he had misjudged. Leaving the cup and saucer in his lap, he put up his hands._

"_I want to know who you really are," Ukyou said evenly, "and why you're here."_

"_I told you, I'm a relation—"_

"_On his mother's side, who didn't even know about her problems? Can you even tell me how she died?"_

_When Tsuzuki came up blank even on a convincing lie, she knew she had him. "If you were really any relative of Kazutaka's, you would know about his parents' murders. You seem to know him well enough, though, if you claim he's still alive, although I'd be interested to know what your evidence is to support an assertion like that. Not to mention, how you got my name and address, because Kazutaka sure as hell wouldn't give it to you willingly. So I'll ask again: Who are you, and what do you want with me?"_

"_I wasn't lying," Tsuzuki insisted. Though perhaps this wasn't the time to explain how he and Muraki were related. "Muraki and I really do share a history—"_

"_And you think that should make me _trust _you? I'm sorry, Mr. Tsuzuki, but I'm going to have to ask you to get out of my house right now and never come back, before I do something both of us will regret."_

_Tsuzuki shut his eyes. She could shoot him if she wanted—not the way he would want to reveal his nature to her, but he would if it came down to it. If he didn't make this work, there was nowhere else he could go. Enma would have taken his running as a sign he had abandoned his post. He might even have agents searching for Tsuzuki as he sat here in Ukyou's living room drinking tea, and Tsuzuki knew well the consequences of abandonment if he was caught. Even if he returned to Meifu of his own volition before things got too out of hand, he still had Hisoka to face; and that was not something he was sure he could ever do again._

"_I'm not his friend, Ms. Sakuraiji," he said, meeting her gaze unblinkingly. "Couldn't be farther from it. Believe me, I don't want to hurt you. I know full well what he is, and what he's done. The people he's hurt._

"_He hurt me, too, and the people I care about. You want the truth? I'll give it to you: I need to put this right, and in order to do that, I need to find Muraki, wherever he's hiding. And when I find him, I intend to make him pay for his crimes. Now, if that means I have to kill him, so be it, but I can't let him get away again. Not if there's anything I can do about it. I understand that asking you to help me do that is putting you in a spot that maybe you don't want to be in, but I've run out of ideas. You're my last hope. If there's _anyone _who can lead me to him, even just point me in the right direction, it's you."_

_Tsuzuki swallowed. She still had the pistol trained on him, but her grip had loosened just slightly, her knuckles no longer white._

"_Please," he tried, lowering his voice. "I know it's a lot to ask. I would ask you to think of the lives at risk if we do nothing, but that wouldn't exactly be honest. My reasons for doing this are pretty selfish, but that doesn't make them any less right. Just help me find him, Ms. Sakuraiji, and I promise you, neither he nor I will ever trouble you again."_

_Having said his piece, Tsuzuki held his breath. It seemed a long, tense while before Ukyou finally lowered the gun, but even then he didn't dare move._

"_What do you want from me?" Her voice was small, defeated in the big house._

_And at last Tsuzuki allowed himself to blink and breathe. "I was hoping I might be able to stay a few nights while I do some investigating in the area. Perhaps you and I could talk about your relationship—"_

"_What relationship?" Ukyou scoffed. "I haven't seen Kazutaka in years—hell, I haven't even heard from him since 'ninety-eight when he sent his last good-byes. Like I said: I thought he was dead."_

_But that wasn't a "no."_

"_You might still have some useful information you're not aware of. I promise, Ms. Sakuraiji," Tsuzuki insisted. "I won't get in your way. You'll hardly even notice I'm here. And I'll pull my weight around the house. I can clean and do the gardening, and cook—well, not quite cook, but I can put together a salad well enough—"_

"_You don't have to worry about that," she said, and despite herself a smile threatened to return at his efforts. "I work late most days. Sometimes I even spend the night at the office. If you stay, you'll have the house to yourself most of the day. But don't even think of stealing anything. You have money of your own, I take it?"_

"_Enough to get by." _

_He must have put off an honest enough air, because she seemed satisfied with his answer. Even if this did go against everything her reasoning told her was wise and safe. "I'll give you his letters in the morning. Maybe you'll find something in them that will tell you where to search next."_

_And the sooner the better, she left the words unspoken between them._

* * *

That was five months ago. Those few nights had turned into a few weeks, and before either of them knew it, this odd arrangement of passing each other in the same house had become the natural order of their lives.

In the time since, Tsuzuki had gone out of his way to be the perfect houseguest. He cleaned and gardened just as he'd said he would—he had quite a green thumb, to her pleasant surprise—and the night job she took as a sign of good faith, that he didn't wish her to waste a yen or minute of sleep more on account of him. Ukyou was becoming accustomed to his gifts as well: leftovers from the izakaya in the refrigerator, or pastries or a bottle of wine on the breakfast table—left for her to find like the birds the neighborhood stray sometimes left on her doorstep. Surely not the sort of things a psychopath or murderer would do.

Yet there was still something he was hiding after all this time. It wasn't long into his stay that Ukyou made him drop the "Ms. Sakuraiji," but he seemed to prefer her calling him by his family name. It was also quite clear to Ukyou that Tsuzuki wasn't just looking for Muraki. He knew everything she did about her old friend by now, yet he continued to beg her pardon to stay on. Almost as if . . .

_He has no other place to go._

Ukyou accepted that months ago, without any need for explanation on Tsuzuki's part. He didn't need to explain what was plain to see. Nor was she coldhearted enough to kick Tsuzuki out when his continued presence was hardly any trouble.

But there was something else, something Ukyou still couldn't put her finger on, some reason she hesitated to broach the subject with Tsuzuki, ask him why he hadn't left.

Something that pulled her toward the door of the spare bedroom before she headed off for work. Just to make sure he was there, she assured herself. Just to make sure he had made it back alright.

Hesitating on the doorframe, she slid it open a crack with the utmost care, so as not to wake him and deprive him of what little sleep he probably got with his odd-houred job. A job she admired him for taking, even if she occasionally missed his company. She couldn't help it. He did have a magnetic personality, when he was up and about at his full speed.

He was sleeping so deeply now he looked like a statue, heavy and immobile, placed just where exhaustion had set him down. It was difficult to even see the signs of his breathing. Ukyou could just see his face beneath the dark fringe of his mussed hair, and it seemed to her as peaceful as a bodhisattva' really was a beautiful man.

Until he opened his eyes. Those dark, burgundy eyes that reminded her of deep pools of wine, or the cloying center of a rose. She had one that same color, if she remembered right, a request of Kazutaka's. Now she wondered if there was a genuine connection.

Those eyes had mesmerized her against her better judgment when she invited Tsuzuki in for tea, that first afternoon last September when he came to her. There was something about the way he looked at Ukyou that made her feel like the last person in the world, and she had wondered if he stared at everyone that way, or just her.

There was no way she could make him understand it from her perspective, but every day he was still here she regretted letting him into her home. Every day that passed with him in it she felt as though he was lowering her defenses, piece by piece, and she was not strong enough to say stop. There had already been that one indiscretion, which they both had gone on with their lives after as though it had never happened. In fact, it was soon after that Tsuzuki told her he was looking for night work.

But there was something more, a darkness she sensed in Tsuzuki that made her uneasy, even if she could not honestly say she feared him. He had spelled it out plain as day to her upon that first meeting: He was here to kill Kazutaka. Something Ukyou wanted desperately for him not to do, though she would be lying if she said she was ignorant of her old friend's crimes, or that she in any way condoned or excused them.

Yet the longer she let Tsuzuki linger here, the less neutral she could claim herself to be, and the more complicit she was in Kazutaka's ultimate fate. And that, in her mind, whether it was right or not, was tantamount to betrayal. Of her old friend's trust, his love—everything he had ever done to keep her safe and separate from his world. Whatever monster Tsuzuki claimed Kazutaka was, she still loved him. And she suspected, despite all his promises, that somewhere deep down in his unreadable soul, Tsuzuki did as well. He would not have come here otherwise.

If experience told Ukyou anything, things could not hold as they were. Eventually, something was going to happen, and she would have no one to blame for it but herself. For allowing Tsuzuki in, for setting this ball rolling.

Yet the longer he remained here with her, the longer his goal was put off. Ukyou knew she would not be able to interfere if Tsuzuki and Kazutaka were to meet again, but she could do this much. She could draw out the inevitable.

She shut the door as silently as she had opened it, slipped on her shoes and coat in the _genkan_, and left the house.

Between the short walk to the station and the train ride into the city, her mind settled, her thoughts cooling to a calm, flat surface against which the results of overnight tests could bounce and filter through.

She arrived at her office within the Sakuraiji labs to the friendly faces of her assistants, who greeted her over their morning coffees with the respect her work, and not her father's prestigious name, had earned her. They followed her, clipboards under their arms, as she slipped on her lab coat and knelt by the cages. Though it was a task typically assigned to interns and new hires, Ukyou preferred to feed and water the test animals herself. It was the least she could do when they had sacrificed their lives and comfort for her project.

"Blood work came back on the Alzheimer's test group," a woman named Akiyama told her while she worked. "In all cases, the samples showed antibodies with successfully integrated Subject-X DNA. We'll still have to perform scans to see if that's translated into a reduction of plaque in the brain—"

"But in the meantime," said Miyake, a young man fresh out of his college internship, with a respectful glance at his colleague, "the injected mice are displaying heightened energy levels, they're accomplishing our memory problems in record time—even finishing them faster than some of the younger mice in the control group. It's too soon to say, of course, but I'd swear by their behavior they were actually exhibiting signs of age reversal."

At the news, Ukyou's hand stilled on the rabbit she had been stroking. She closed the cage and stood back up, gesturing for the clipboard so she might check the findings herself. "You're right. It is too soon," she told the two. "But this is encouraging data. Very encouraging. Good work, both of you."

As much as a part of her wanted to shout for joy, Ukyou forced herself to rein in her triumphant smile in front of her assistants. Though her project had made huge strides, showing promise in combatting fungal infection, viruses, cancer, and now dementia and auto-immune disorders, these were still only small steps being taken in only one lab within the larger pharmaceutical world.

But she could not have made such strides without Kazutaka's help. Namely the tissue samples he had given her several years ago, swearing that within them lay the secret to eternal life, only waiting for one worthy enough to unlock it. Apparently, he had not believed himself to be that person. It was a great burden of expectation that he had placed on Ukyou's shoulders, but neither her curiosity as a scientist, nor her conscience as a medical student and member of the human race, had allowed her to pass up his challenge.

Nor had she ever regretted it.

What she wouldn't give, she often thought, to meet the individual whose DNA was going to be the salvation of millions.

* * *

"What a horrible existence," Wakaba remarked as she gazed out over Kurashiki at night from behind a pair of pocket binoculars. "I can't think of any fate worse than becoming a hungry ghost. And that's saying a lot, considering what we've seen."

"Well, hopefully she shows when everyone says she should," her partner agreed, "and we can wrap this up nice and easy. Nothing like going whale-watching and seeing no whales."

The two had come to the old seaside town looking for a woman who was listed in the Kiseki as deceased, but had missed her court date with Enma. According to her coworkers, she had recently begun showing up for work at the firm like a zombie: ambling about slowly, dragging her feet; spending all her time rifling through reference books and making pot after pot of coffee without uttering a word; glaring like death itself at anyone who confronted her about her strange behavior, and generally scaring away clients, until their boss finally convinced her to go home and take some sick leave.

When the shinigami arrived at her apartment, however, it was empty and had been unoccupied for some time. Which would have been a temporary set-back if not for a string of strange attacks at the adjacent park. Something had sent three otherwise unrelated men to the emergency room—and shortened their wicks significantly back at the Castle of Candles. And each of them had recounted a similar tale to police: They were all attacked an hour after dark . . . by a skeletal female corpse with a bloated belly, grasping claws, and bulging yellow eyes.

The timing fit, the first of the attacks occurring at the same time the woman's coworkers noticed her unprofessional behavior. Wakaba suspected something sudden and unforeseen as the cause for her demise, like an aneurism. Terazuma, foul play (but as his partner reminded him, he always suspected foul play). They would only know for certain, however, when they captured her and brought her back to Enma-cho.

As for what had caused her transformation into the living dead . . .

"How do you suppose you become a hungry ghost anyway?"

Wakaba lowered the binoculars. She bit her lip. "Good question," she said. "The literature's not real clear. I think usually a person has to suffer some pretty deep spiritual trauma that keeps them from going to their rest, or else there's unfinished business they feel they need to resolve first. But I don't know if you can completely rule out environmental factors, either. There's still a lot of residual energy hanging around here from all those skirmishes between the Heike and Genji clans that could have influenced our target."

"Hallowed ground in more ways then one, huh?" Terazuma muttered around his cigarette.

"I heard about this one case in Okinawa a few years back," he added as the memory surfaced, "where this old guy who'd seen his squad die in the war, his leg turned green and swelled up like a huge zucchini, all the way down to his toes, and every night the ghosts of his squad mates—their guts all hanging out and everything—would come and drink water out of it until their thirst was satisfied."

"Ew!" Wakaba shot him a horrified expression. "Don't be gross, Hajime. What was the point of telling me that story anyway?"

"I dunno. I just thought it was interesting."

"You always have to tell icky stories after we go out for eel, don't you?" Well, maybe they should stop going out for eel before a case, Terazuma wanted to say, but he thought it wiser to keep his mouth shut. "If ours has its intestines hanging out," his partner accused him, "I'm going to blame you for it."

"_Me? _How do I have anything—"

But it wasn't worth the trouble. Not to mention, something else had captured Terazuma's attention, pushing all thought of hungry ghosts from his mind. A sound, perhaps, that Kokushungei had picked up but was long gone by the time he shut his mouth and trained his ears toward it. Or perhaps it was just a feeling in the air, like he couldn't quite put his finger on. Like they were being—

"Earth to Hajime-chan," his partner said, shaking him back to the present. "Did you hear anything I just said?"

"Uh. . . ."

"What?"

Whatever it was, it was gone now. "Nothing. You were saying about our ghost?"

A movement in the park down below caught his eye. It may have been too far for Wakaba to see without the aid of binoculars, but he had no problem making out the anomalous, ambling humanoid shape with the Black Lion's aid. Having a parasitic-type shikigami riding shotgun on your soul had its major drawbacks, but superhuman senses was not one of them. "Never mind," he said. "Our perp just showed up. And right on time, too."

"She's not our 'perp'," Wakaba reminded him, as she had to on so many of the cases they had worked together. "She's just as much a victim of her condition as those men she put in the hospital. We agreed we're taking her down gently, remember?"

"I know, I remember," he muttered. Though they were so far drawing a blank on her reason for targeting the men, it didn't appear as though any of them was guilty of a crime: One worked as a night custodian at the park; the second was a salaryman who had stopped to use the restroom on the walk home from the station; while the third had just been out enjoying an evening run. "Wait till she's chosen her victim and spring our trap while she's distracted."

Terazuma checked the release on his crossbow anyway.

"But if she manages to suck one more soul, I don't care what she is, I'm doin' it my way."

They dematerialized off the roof of the apartment building across the street, and reappeared in the park itself. Wakaba chose to stake out the area between the jungle gym and restrooms, while Terazuma had the clearing on the hill, from which he could survey a good length of the walking path.

_Any sign of her? _Wakaba's voice sounded in his mind.

_I thought I spotted her at the edge of the woods just east of here. Must have popped back into the foliage to wait for her next victim._

_There's no one where I'm at. Maybe the attacks have scared people away from the park. _A thoughtful pause on Wakaba's part. Then: _I'm moving my position to the fountain. It's still early; there might be some couples out and about._

Terazuma sent her a mental "roger." It was all he had time for before there came a suspicious noise in the brush behind him.

His ears twitched, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up. The brushing of leaves against a body was so slight a deer might have missed it; but with Kokushungei at the helm, it rang ominously in his inner ear. Terazuma reached under his trench coat, wrapping his fingers about the handle of his crossbow. Spitting out his cigarette, blowing out the last breath of smoke, he tried to taste the air. Nothing. Maybe Kannuki was right and he did need to cut back. At least to one pack a day.

One thing was certain, however: It was no hungry ghost that had made the noise. Not that Terazuma had faced a whole lot of them in his career, but he had never known a hungry ghost to try quite so hard to mask its presence. He could sense the heat of it, watching him from some spot a short ways into the brush. He dared not return its gaze. _Got something here, _he warned Wakaba.

She sounded hopeful. _Our ghost?_

_Hold on. _Though it went against all Terazuma's instincts, he turned his back on the presence and walked away.

As soon as he was sure he was over the crest of the hill and out of sight, however, he teleported himself into the wood beside his watcher.

Somehow the black greatcoat and double-headed eagle crest came as no surprise to Terazuma. Though his sudden appearance there did catch the Peacekeeping officer off guard.

For about one second. It was not for nothing that only the most elite shinigami were chosen for the Peacekeeping force. The man was reaching for the sword beneath the folds of his coat in a heartbeat. Even though Terazuma had been expecting it, he considered himself more than a little lucky that he managed to kick the other's sword arm down and get his crossbow up under the officer's jaw, all without being eviscerated himself.

Naturally, that small triumph brought a grin to his lips. "Not so fast, Peacekeeping dog," he warned through his teeth. "I'd keep it in your pants if I were you, unless you want to be breathing through a straw for the next few days."

The officer had been a young man in his early to mid-twenties when he died, with straight black hair pulled back in a ponytail, and the physique of a martial artist. And, thanks to the animosity between the two departments, and the unofficial taboo against inter-office sociability in general, Terazuma had no idea who he was.

Only that this man was interfering with his investigation, and Terazuma hated him for it. "Now," he growled, "mind explaining what you're doing following a couple of Summons agents?"

The Peacekeeping officer only smiled. If Terazuma hadn't liked the look of him before, he was positively revolted by that shit-eating grin.

Terazuma found out the reason for it soon enough—and not the way he would have liked. Something whistled through the air—right before stabbing pain lit up his right arm and shoulder.

On instinct, he pulled the crossbow's trigger. But the Peacekeeping agent had already moved, ducking as the bolt flew off harmlessly into the wood and drawing his sword from its sheath. Terazuma had no time to face whoever had attacked him from behind; Ponytail Dude and his blade had his total attention up front. Terazuma swung his bow up to bear again, only to have it knocked out of his grip by a slap with the flat of the sword and the sharp pain lancing through his shoulder. The Peacekeeping officer's elbow in his solar plexus was all it took then to knock him on his backside, and prove to Terazuma that he had bitten off way more than he could chew.

As the tip of that blade swung down to level with his nose, Terazuma had no choice but to put up his hands, and hope the other man didn't harbor any grudges.

He didn't see the dark figure perched in the budding cherry tree, reaching for another fistful of needle-like shuriken from a shoulder-belt.

Wakaba saw it, though. She'd had a feeling something was up when Terazuma had sent his last mental message. Teleporting to his last location, she was just in time to watch the figure in the tree let fly a quartet of blades at her partner.

Wakaba slapped the attacker with a fuda before they could loose another round; and as the stranger yelped at the shock, Wakaba could make out a womanly figure beneath the cinched tunic and Peacekeeping insignia. Her face and head were covered by a scarf, however, leaving nothing for Wakaba to identify the woman by but two hazel eyes. They glared murderously back at her before the woman leapt away.

Afraid she would go after Terazuma again, Wakaba drew her halberd from the sling across her back. It extended to its full length with a snap. "Spirits of the south wind," she murmured in the old dialect as she raised the halberd above her head, feeling it warm in her hands, "heed my call: Drive my enemy from before me. . . ."

A hot wind rose up around her, gaining in strength with each revolution of the blade over her head. With a swoop of the halberd, Wakaba let it fly at the Peacekeeping woman. The woman raised her arms before her face and tried to stand her ground, but it was no use: In a way that would have been comical in any other situation, the gust out of the south plucked her off her feet and flung her away over the tree tops.

Seeing what had become of his partner, and not wanting to test Wakaba's still-glowing halberd for himself, Ponytail Dude drew the point of his blade off Terazuma, lifted into the air, and teleported away. To Enma-cho or just the next block, Wakaba didn't really care where. She rushed to Terazuma's side as he pushed himself up into sitting position.

Not an easy feat when one arm felt like it was on fire and dipped in liquid nitrogen all at the same time. "Son of a fucking bitch—"

"Hajime!" Wakaba dropped to her knees beside him, but was careful not to touch him. "What happened? Are you okay?"

"Sure, sure. Peacekeeping asshole just shot me is all. Nothing I can't walk off." Hissing against the sting, he pulled one of the narrow blades out, and got his first good look at it. His blood was dark against the black metal, and where the two made contact it hissed and bubbled in a way that was not at all natural or encouraging.

A wave of vertigo washed over Terazuma from out of nowhere. The ground pitched violently beneath him, somersaulting in on itself, and the last thing he knew was his partner screaming his name before everything went black.

* * *

**Note: **Terazuma's anecdote about hungry ghosts in Okinawa is a reference to the short story "Droplets" ("Suiteki") by Medoruma Shun. Go check it out.


	4. Bind your hands with string

**Note:** This chapter contains some original characters introduced in this story's prequel, "Damaged". I've attempted to recap a little of their involvement in that story so as to make sense for readers who may have skipped that story or don't want to slog through it again. . . .

* * *

"And you're sure these two agents were following _you_?" Tatsumi said. "They didn't just happen to be on assignment in the area?"

"Trust me. I couldn't be more sure if they had it all spelled out in a warrant—Aitch!"

Terazuma growled as Hisoka touched the alcohol-soaked cotton ball to his wound, but willed himself calm. Surprisingly, it didn't seem to take as much effort as usual to keep Kokushungei at bay, given the strength of his anger. Which Hisoka was getting a full dose of the longer he sat next to the man on the floral-patterned love seat. He didn't see that he had much of a choice in the matter, though; the only other person there Terazuma would trust to treat his wounds was Wakaba, and lest they chance a blow-up in her own apartment, she was out of the question.

She sighed as she set a tray of tea and cups on the coffee table top. "As far as I can tell," she told her coworkers, "tailing us _was _their assignment. They didn't say anything when Hajime questioned them about it—well, there wasn't much time for words with everything happening so quickly—but . . ."

"You think they were sitting on you in case you went to meet Tsuzuki?" Natsume supplied what they were all thinking.

Wakaba nodded gravely. "I'd bet my salary on it." She took a seat in one of the armchairs, drawing her legs up beneath her. Gave K, who was occupying the armrest, a scratch behind the ears. "Chief Todoroki must be getting desperate if he's sending his agents to spy on shinigami in the field now."

"But where would he get the idea that _we _know Tsuzuki's location?" Terazuma said, speaking of himself and Wakaba.

"Nowhere," said Tatsumi. "But it sends a pretty clear message to us that no matter what we do, they have us under surveillance."

He had a point, but at the moment it didn't concern Hisoka. What happened to Terazuma was an outrage, a breach of inter-departmental protocol that was inexcusable. But it was also the clearest admission they were going to get that Todoroki's department still had no clue as to where Tsuzuki was. And they must have been running out of ideas to go this far.

"What do we do about this?" Wakaba asked the new chief. "We can't let them get away with it. It sets a bad precedent between the departments. It's not just that they interfered with our investigation, putting more mortal lives at risk in the process. I mean, how long is it going to be before Todoroki declares open season on anyone employed by the Summons Division?"

"It won't come to that," Tatsumi promised her through his teeth. "Make no mistake, I will be taking this matter to the highest level."

"And what if Enma condones Peacekeeping's actions?"

The other four looked at Natsume as though stunned he would suggest such a thing. Not that it wasn't on everyone's mind, Hisoka noted, but if what he said was true, they had to face the possibility that their entire department was to be treated as suspect. All of them, potential traitors. And therefore, replaceable. "We can't jump to conclusions," he cautioned his partner.

"No," Natsume agreed. "But we can take charge on our side. We need to enact tighter security measures."

Tatsumi folded his arms. "Tighter than three layers of noise-canceling, anti-scrying spells," he said, "not to mention a shadow barrier—?"

"I meant _digital _security measures." Natsume told Tatsumi, "No disrespect to your abilities, Chief, but they just aren't going to cut it in this day and age. We need to set up a new firewall around Summons' systems for starters. One that isn't almost ten years old. And a secure server and encrypted e-mail, something separate from what we use to communicate about cases. I've already talked to Watari about it, and he says he can set it up for us overnight. Everyone's used to him staying at his office after-hours; Peacekeeping will hardly bat an eye."

"That won't be necessary," Tatsumi told him point-blank.

Natsume blinked behind his glasses, as if he couldn't believe what he had heard. "I beg to differ. I think it's absolutely necessary."

"And it gives Peacekeeping another reason to suspect we're keeping something from them."

"But they already _know_ we're keeping things from them! Terazuma is proof of that." The man in question harrumped, but he did not refute Natsume. After all, he had been making a similar argument all along. "Besides, Peacekeeping wouldn't have to know about this. At least it would give us a way to fight back without arousing further suspicion. I wouldn't say it'll give us an edge, because everyone else is already using this technology against us. But it is a first step towards leveling the playing field."

A knock on the door prevented Tatsumi from having to answer right away, though Natsume was not shy about showing his frustration. Despite the momentary interruption, Hisoka could tell he wasn't about to let the matter slide.

The secretary-turned-chief answered the door with all possible haste, and Kazuma Shin swept into the room, wasting no time shrugging out of her Peacekeeping greatcoat and asking, "Are we secure?"

"What's _she _doing here?" Terazuma muttered, while Tatsumi answered: "I wouldn't have asked you here if we weren't."

"And I wouldn't be a very good miko if I didn't know how to seal my own apartment." Wakaba unfolded herself from her seat. She said to the security agent, "I know it's getting crowded in here, but make yourself at home. I'll go get another cup."

"I'll get it." No sooner had Hisoka secured the last of Terazuma's bandages than he was shooting to his feet. "I need a smoke anyway."

"I'm impressed," Kazuma called after him as he went straight to the correct cupboard. "You really know your way around the young lady's place, Hajime."

Terazuma's glare as he plunked an extra tea cup down in the tray was no doubt about the closest thing to a "F.U." he dared deliver in his partner's apartment. "Where'd you hide my smokes, Kannuki?" he grumbled as he made his way back to the kitchen.

Wakaba hurried after him. "They're by the door, right where you left them. Don't light up in here! Wait till you're out on the balcony!"

Despite the pair's efforts at playing host, the tea went untouched. Throwing her coat over the back of K's chair, Kazuma started in on her gloves. In a snug pair of trousers, button-up shirt open just enough to reveal a touch of cleavage, at least she didn't look like she had just come from the gym this time. "Believe me," she told Tatsumi, running a hand through her short dark hair, "if I'd known Todoroki was going to pull this type of shit, the least I would have done was give you guys a heads-up."

"I know," said Tatsumi. "It would surprise me more if he had informed all his agents they were to start spying on fellow shinigami." After all, wasn't Tatsumi doing the same, keeping his schemes regarding counter-espionage contained to only four of the people under his command? "Still, you should know I intend to press charges."

"For what?" Kazuma scoffed. "I'm sorry, Tatsumi, but the way I heard it, our agents weren't exactly unscathed."

"Were any of them injured? Shot with poisoned needles?"

She sobered. It could never be said that her sympathies weren't with Tsuzuki's comrades first and foremost ever since the manhunt had begun. Her presence there was proof enough of that. "No," Kazuma said. "But don't think that will deter Todoroki. You're not the only chief who'd go to war for his men, Tatsumi. Are those the shuriken Terazuma was hit with?"

Hisoka confirmed that, and handed one over to her, careful to keep a washrag between the metal and his skin. Perhaps its effect only worked on contact with blood, but Hisoka was taking no chances. Especially since his mental barriers had had enough to suffer tonight from Terazuma's trauma.

A glance was all Kazuma needed to confirm her fears. "It's amazing he's still ambulatory," she said with a nod after Terazuma. "If it wasn't for that lion he's sharing his body with, he'd be out of commission for the better part of a week at least."

"You've seen something like that before?"

"I won't bore you with all the sciencey mumbo-jumbo, but the long and short of it is this shuriken has been coated with a radioactive polymer designed specifically to interfere with the electrical field of shinigami bodies. It works on our systems like a paralytic—sort of like eating pufferfish that was prepared wrong, only coupled with burning pain. To add further injury to injury, it brings the regeneration process to a virtual stand-still, so that even when the paralysis wears off, you're still hampered by your wounds, however nasty those might be."

"Todoroki is taking no chances," Tatsumi muttered.

"I've never heard of a reaction like Terazuma's before," Kazuma added with a thoughtful note, "but then I've never heard of it being used on an agent with a parasitic shikigami. That lion of his must be siphoning off some of the effects. Man, what the boys back at the office wouldn't give for a chance to study this."

"This is what it's come to, then," Hisoka muttered. "Shinigami against shinigami?"

Kazuma shot him a knowing grin at that.

"You don't think Terazuma was their real target, do you? Hell, not that I blame the guy, but if he hadn't interfered, I doubt any of us would be here. Usually our agents don't like to carry the likes of this stuff," she said hefting the blade, "into the field on their person—too risky if you have a mishap—but like Tatsumi said, right now they're not taking any chances. You know my department is out for one man and one man only. And if rumor is to be believed, Tsuzuki isn't just any shinigami."

But a hard look from Tatsumi stopped Kazuma from taking that thought further.

"I managed to get a decent look at one of Hajime's attackers," Wakaba said as she returned. "It was a woman. I'd say about Hisoka's height. She was hiding her face behind a wimple or hijab of some sort, but I remember her eyes: They had gray edges."

"There's only one agent I know who disguises herself like that." Kazuma gritted through her teeth. "Sister Agrippina. Figures."

"Terazuma was attacked by a nun?" Hisoka said. It was hard to imagine anyone of that profession joining a security force, let alone one as deadly as Enma's Peacekeeping Division.

"She was put in a leper sanatorium for women when she was a teenager, back in the 'thirties," Kazuma explained. "Decided to join the holy order that had stood by her when her own family would not. But don't let the name fool you: She's deadly. Some of the old-timers around the office call her Apollo's Viper behind her back, after the Greek god of plague."

Among other things, Hisoka added to himself. He could see how such a nickname wouldn't be entirely meant as a compliment.

"She's one of the most vicious agents we've got, and that's saying a lot if you knew some of my coworkers. Holds the record for most rogue shinigami apprehended or decommissioned in the field, by a landslide. If legend is to be believed, she went kicking and screaming to her own death."

"She didn't seem that tough when I met her," Wakaba said as much to herself as the rest of them. "She and her partner both left in a hurry when they lost the element of surprise. I barely touched them myself."

"You probably weren't supposed to know they were there."

"Possibly," Hisoka muttered. "Or Todoroki wanted us to know just how much we were being watched."

By the silence that succeeded him, they must have all been thinking more or less the same thing.

A string of highly creative curses from the direction of the balcony broke the tension, and even brought a laugh bubbling out of Natsume that he tried to stifle.

"Oh dear." Wakaba went to see to her partner, telling them over her shoulder, "Sorry to kick you all out—it's not that I don't appreciate you all coming, but Hajime's been through a lot tonight, and he could really use his rest. . . ."

"Say no more. We'll get out of your way." Natsume shot to his feet, K taking that as her cue to hop up onto his shoulders. Hisoka offered to help clean up the first aid kit and bloodied rags, but Wakaba waved him off with a smile that was forced, no matter how genuinely grateful she was for their support.

"Tatsumi, I was hoping we might continue this conversation in private," Kazuma said, and the two pairs went their separate ways once outside Wakaba's door.

That was when Natsume's own smile turned bitter. "Well, that was enlightening. Nice to see Summons is still a haven for dinosaurs and Luddites. You know when I first came here in the 'eighties, they were still using typewriters to type up reports? And this in the golden age of personal computers! Looks like nothing much's changed."

At K's peering over his shoulder at Hisoka, Natsume rubbed behind her head. If the cat was good for one thing, it was evening out the emotional spikes that tried Hisoka's patience with his new partner. "The one I really feel sorry for is you, Kurosaki. You're pretty young compared to some of these guys who have been doing this thing forever, and you still have to put up with all that ancient technology."

"Careful," Hisoka said. "I'm probably one of those Luddites you're talking about. I came from a pretty traditional family. No television, no computers, no Internet." Natsume swore in sympathy at that. "I didn't have a cellphone until I came here."

"But you've _learned_, you've taken steps to _catch up_. See, that's just my point: Being afraid or suspicious of something just because it's new is no reason to discard it all together. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing but the utmost respect for Tatsumi. He's had this promotion coming for a long time and, even if the circumstances aren't ideal, I applaud him for finally getting it.

"But the man is stuck in the past. And his fear of technology is going to keep us from doing everything we can to make sure _we _find Tsuzuki first, and stay safe doing it."

"I'm not sure fear is the problem," Hisoka said, feeling one of them had to come to the former-secretary's defense.

"Lack of understanding, then. Whatever. We need to do something about our security, and I don't much feel like waiting for our chief's approval to start. Neither does Terazuma, by the sound of it."

Hisoka allowed himself a smile at that. "Looks like you two have something in common after all."

"Yeah, well. We need to hit Peacekeeping back before what happened to him happens to the rest of us. And by the look of things, with that polymer Shin was talking about, we have a _lot_ of catching up to do."

"That's what I don't get," Hisoka said as much to himself as his new partner, shaking his head. Natsume and K both looked his way, begging elucidation with their stares. "The coating on that shuriken . . . the way it was designed specifically for shinigami. . . . I feel like there's a lot we're not getting. How come we've never heard of it, and where would Peacekeeping have gotten such a thing? It seems like it would take someone awfully familiar with the way our bodies work to come up with a weapon like that in the first place."

"You're not saying what I think you're saying, are you? I mean, Watari-sensei's done some dangerous things in the past in the name of science, but there's no way he'd be on board with anything he thought might be used to hurt Tsuzuki, let alone the rest of the Summons Division."

"I know that." To be honest, that wasn't what had Hisoka so worried. "But that doesn't mean someone isn't using his discarded discoveries for evil purposes without his knowledge."

Hisoka's phone buzzed just then, and at a glance at the screen: "It's Watari."

"Speak of the devil," Natsume snorted.

The man in question seemed surprised to get a human response. "I figured it would just go to voicemail. Innit past your bedtime, Bon?"

"Emergency meeting. Something happened on Terazuma and Wakaba's latest case. I'll explain in person later," he added at Watari's sounds of curiosity and concern. He didn't actually suspect their in-house scientist of plotting against them, but he did doubt whether Wakaba's seals extended past her apartment door. "You had something you wanted to tell me?"

"Uh, yeah. Results came back on your shoggoth—"

"And?" Even though the phone was not on speaker, Natsume could pick up that much. He stepped closer, eager for more information, and Hisoka let him and K listen in.

"We-e-e-ell, I think it's better if I show you this in person, too," Watari said, and they could hear him tapping his pen against his desk in the background. "Let's just say you're probably not gonna like what I found."

* * *

Terazuma was still sleeping off the effects of the poison on her couch when Wakaba checked in on him, long after the others had gone. She had put on a smiling face, played inviting hostess while they talked over this outrage in calm, rational voices; but she could never confide in them how she really felt.

How she was ready to murder those two agents herself if they ever tried anything like this on her partner again. How she might have gone to their office tomorrow morning to do just that if anything worse had befallen Hajime on account of their actions.

At least his sleep seemed deep and untroubled. Though she might not have been able to say the same for Kokushungei, who at that very moment was busy metabolizing the poison, and in who knew what kind of pain.

Not that Wakaba was unsympathetic, but it could never be said that she was one to pass up a perfect opportunity. Gingerly, and ready to leap back at any moment, she perched herself on the edge of the couch. A thin blanket still separated them, but she could feel Hajime's hip against hers, warm and solid. So far so good. So she reached out, and pushed a lock of sweat-soaked hair off his forehead, just grazing the skin with her fingertip. Was she imagining it, or did the stripes beneath his eyes seem fainter?

His pointed ear twitched, however, like a cat in a dream, and his closed eyes scrunched a bit as first the discomfort came back to him, then consciousness. Wakaba pulled back her hand.

"How are you feeling?" she asked him through his groans.

"Like a volcano and a comet made a baby in my head and it exploded." He blinked his eyes open, taking in his surroundings. And her. "How long have I been out?"

"Only a couple hours. I made you some tea. It's herbal. Should help with the headache, too. Think you can stomach some?"

Using only his left arm, he managed to pushed himself up against the armrest, and Wakaba handed him the mug. Their fingers overlapped as it exchanged hands, and Wakaba fought the instinctive urge to draw back, allowing flesh to linger against flesh. She was only surprised when Hajime failed to notice.

But he had other ailments to occupy his thoughts. And at the moment, trying to keep the tea down took a lot of his energy. He made a face, but forced himself to swallow anyway. "You, uh, said you made this yourself?"

She shot him a glare. "I said it was herbal, didn't I? It doesn't have to taste good to work." But she couldn't stop her grin from showing. "Though I suppose I could have added a little more honey."

"Or a good aged scotch. You know, just as a suggestion."

Wakaba laughed. She supposed that was his macho-man way of saying thanks. But she sobered again soon enough. "How long do you think Kuro-chan's going to be out of commission?"

"Dunno," Hajime groaned. "It's pretty quiet in here right now. Like there's no one home at the moment but me. But _I _should be back to normal by morning," he added, even if it was just another transparent show of machismo. "Ready to get back out there and finish up this hungry ghost business—"

He tried to raise himself into a sitting position to prove his point, but even that proved too much for him. Wakaba caught the mug before it could spill, set it back on the coffee table, and gripped his shoulders, easing him back down. "We'll worry about whether you're fit enough to return to work in the morning," she told him. "You need to get this nasty stuff out of your system first; _then _we'll see about you going back out on the case. For now, you should get your rest."

Grudgingly, he accepted that she was right. He was so adorable when he was being petulant that Wakaba could no longer help herself. She had to take advantage of the situation, in case this was the only opportunity she ever got.

As she eased Hajime back down on the couch, Wakaba leaned in, and planted a kiss on his mouth. Carefully at first, lest she have to jump back and hit him with a sealing fuda; but when no change was forthcoming from Hajime, but for an appreciative little moan and a relaxing of his frame beneath her, Wakaba took that as the OK to make it deeper, more solid. More evocative of everything she had been forced to keep to herself since realizing she had feelings beyond the platonic and professional for her partner.

By the crooked smile left on Hajime's lips when they finally parted, she could see she hadn't been wrong in thinking he felt the same way, even if he had gone out of his way over the years to make it appear quite the opposite. "Guess I should get myself shot by Peacekeeping more often, huh?"

"It wouldn't hurt," Wakaba told him, returning his smile.

"Well, now that you mention it . . ."

She patted his thigh beneath the blanket, rising from the couch. "Just concentrate on getting better. And drink your tea."

"Yes, Mom."

It didn't escape Wakaba's attention, however, as he settled back into the cushions, that his spirits seemed higher already.

* * *

Imai recognized the restaurant as the sight of one of the Livertaker murders last year, but that wasn't why his partner had invited him. Asai loved the place for its calming traditional atmosphere, its friendly staff who were patient with his young daughter when he brought her.

And the beef wasn't half bad either, which he insisted they order, though Imai wasn't a big fan of the price tag. "I'm buying," he said to Imai's hesitation.

"Really, Asai, I can't ask you to do that—"

"Just let me treat you, Sempai. With all you've been through the last few months, it's the least I can do. Besides, the wife and I both agree you got a raw deal. I should have been suspended right there along with you, or neither of us should."

"They wouldn't dare suspend a guy with a toddler to take care of," Imai said to his partner's shrug. "How old is little Ayako now, anyway? Three?"

"She'll be four this June."

"Ah. Well, I'll have to send a birthday card."

This was Imai's fifth month of suspension with reduced pay from the Kumamoto Police Department. He still wasn't sure exactly what he'd done to deserve it. The whole case had been messed up, an embarrassment in the local media that they could have done nothing to prevent one way or another.

And perhaps it was just that ineptitude that needed a fall-guy. Even Imai had to admit he was perfect for the role. As if it wasn't enough that the Livertaker murderer had targeted a local teenager, with the Kumamoto P.D. failing to make the connection between the two cases until it was too late. If Inoue's brat hadn't stolen that gun and killed a kid—never mind that that kid was the killer himself; they would never prove that in a court of law now—and if Imai himself hadn't so publicly misplaced his badge, he probably wouldn't be in this spot. The detectives leading the investigation against him practically said so themselves.

Then again, they were the ones who kept telling him he would be back at his desk by the end of the month. They'd first told him that back in October.

They were halfway through March now.

If he had been wielding the gun himself, this internal investigation would be understandable. But Imai had a hunch there was some other reason, some other force at work whom he had set on edge during his own investigation of the Livertaker serial murder case. He just wished he knew _who _he had pissed off, and doing what.

Luckily, he only had himself to feed these days—unlike his partner, with a wife and growing kid. Perhaps Asai's status as a junior detective helped explain why he had not been under the department's scrutiny for nearly as long, and as a result, was back on the force within weeks.

And had been feeding Imai information about his own internal review under the table almost as long. Imai was sure everyone knew, but no one dared speak a word of it.

"Guess I should be thanking your wife for the pears. And the oranges at New Year." Ever since his suspension, Mrs. Asai had sent Imai a gift basket of fruit every month or so. Like she was doing her darnedest to make sure he didn't get scurvy while he was off the beat. And the fruit could not have been cheap. "You can tell her it's okay for her to save her money, though, huh? The pity's nice and all, but you guys don't need to feed me, too."

"You'll have your badge back before the end of the month, I'm sure," Asai assured him, as though reading his thoughts. Imai should be grateful for his partner, really. He'd never been a touchy-feely sort of person himself—neither of them were, really—but Asai seemed to know just what kind of platitudes he most needed to hear. "They'll have no choice but to clear you of any misconduct. There's simply no evidence you did anything wrong."

"Yeah, well, even I'm beginning to wonder about that."

After not too long, their order was brought, a platter of thinly sliced raw beef. The smell from the pot of boiling broth was mouth-watering—it had been too long since Imai had treated himself like this—but with his thoughts so recently with their last case, the red and white-marbled strips brought back images he'd rather not have seen.

Asai, chopsticks in hand, seemed to sense his mood. "What's wrong? I thought you were okay with coming here."

"I am." Letting out his breath, Imai picked up his own. Then thought better of it. "Sorry. I guess it's just thinking about that case all over again . . ."

All the gruesome details, of people coming back from the dead to drink blood and cut out organs, didn't leave him with much of an appetite.

Asai raised his brows. "Then, do you mind if _I—_?"

"_You're _paying for it, Asai. Knock yourself out."

While his partner helped himself to a few slices of beef, loading them one at a time into the boiling broth, he said to Imai: "Then, as long as you're not eating, I guess you wouldn't mind too much if I shared what I've learned about our Dr. Muraki."

Imai, who had been contemplating his small beer—and whether or not he really wanted to finish it at this point—looked up at that. "Yukitaka or Kazutaka?"

"The latter. For some reason, I'm hitting a lot of 'access denied's whenever I try to search the records for Muraki Yukitaka."

"Careful there," Imai told his junior. "You don't want to end up in the same place as me."

Asai nodded his understanding, and went on: "I've had better luck on the grandson, though. Seems his name comes up in connection with a lot of freak accidents, tragedies, and suspicious deaths."

"Well, he _is _a doctor. How suspicious can they be?"

Asai's grin—a rare sight around the office and therefore more than a little unnerving—said he knew just how to pique his partner's curiosity. "Well, there was that fire at the university laboratory in Kyoto a few years back, which coincided with a rash of murdered women—"

"That Dr. Satomi was determined to be responsible for, before he threw himself off a bridge out of guilt. You'll have to do better than that, Asai."

"Satomi was dead _before _the fire. On top of which, we know from the university's own records that Muraki was on site at the time of Satomi's death, assisting his old mentor in his research. And furthermore, the fire was shown to have started in a lab _beneath _Satomi's office, one the university swears they didn't even know was there. Which leads one to wonder—"

"What was going on in that secret lab?" As if their last case hadn't seemed enough like a Gothic horror story. Imai, though, had his doubts. "One problem, Asai. This is all circumstantial."

"I thought you might say as much. Which was why the case of the _Queen Camellia _jumped out at me when I came across it. You remember the story, right? Luxury liner that went up in flames on the East China Sea, had been set up as a gaming cruise—"

"You mean like Sony and Konami—"

"No, I mean games of chance. Roulette, baccarat, pai gow. . . ."

"Gotcha. It was a floating casino."

"For _extremely _high rollers," Asai said. "Business tycoons, senior members of the Diet, even the descendants of the old aristocracy. But the gambling was just a front. The real money-makers were in the cargo hold. Turns out the owner of the line, one Kakyouin, was into human organ trafficking. And guess who was on the passenger manifest as his daughter's personal physician."

"I have to admit," said Imai, "things aren't looking too good for our Dr. Muraki. He's gotten himself involved with some pretty nasty characters. But is it enough to prove guilt by association?"

"All I know is, this guy is like a waterbear, the things he survives. A fire on a lab—a fire on a sinking cruise ship? I'm not sure if he's the luckiest or _un_luckiest guy alive."

Imai was more willing to bet Muraki had had a hand in causing those tragedies. But, as he was so fond of telling his partner, "This is all pretty damning stuff—_if _there was hard evidence to connect Muraki to any wrong-doing. We've been through this dance before, Asai: The guy has no arrest record, no warrants—nothing so much as a traffic ticket issued to him. Inoue already tried connecting him to the Triads, with nothing to show for it."

"Because this game he's playing is all about who you know." Asai was grinning now with the excitement of the chase, the puzzle starting to come together. "Kakyouin was a pretty heavy-hitter. His clients included the rich, famous, and powerful. Plenty of people in high positions in society and government who would have been ruined if their connection to his black-market dealings became public knowledge. _If _Muraki was responsible for sinking the _Queen Camellia_, I'm willing to bet he had a lot of folks eager to show their appreciation for covering that mess up. There's been nothing to confirm the organ-trafficking angle since then but the shaky testimony of just one of the survivors. The wreckage is inaccessible; and even if it wasn't, you know any soft tissue that wasn't destroyed in the fire would be crab poop by now."

Imai knew all too well from being on the receiving end that the truth was only what you could get people to believe, and folks tended to be real eager to believe whatever greased their palms, or caused them the least amount of trouble. Of course, threatening to have your own damning secrets exposed was a pretty good motivator as well. "So our doctor has dirt on some folks in pretty high places. I'd sure like to know what it is."

"Isn't that the million-yen question. I'd love to bring him in for questioning myself, but with no legitimate charges to arrest him on, not even an open case to connect him to. . . ."

"Not to mention, we can't even keep him from leaving the country. If we could get his name on a no-fly list out of Japan—"

Imai trailed off as another thought struck him. It was a long shot, and not one he was particularly excited about pursuing. However . . .

Asai looked up from the strip of beef he was dipping in sauce when his partner remained silent, lost in thought. "What?"

"Just that I know someone in the National Public Safety Commission, is all," Imai grumbled. "Someone who owes me a favor." Though, the way they undoubtedly saw it, _Imai _was the one who owed the favor. This was going to take some skill, and a pretty hefty bribe.

"Let me make some phone calls. In the meantime, Asai, I want you to keep your head down on his Muraki business. Understand me? I don't want you digging too deep and ending up like me. Needless to say, I don't think your wife would be sending me strawberriesif I let that happen."

"I'll do what I can, Sempai, but with you sitting this one out, only one of us has access to the records right now—"

"I mean it," Imai told his partner. "You've done good, kid. Now sit back and let the old man pull a few strings for once, huh?"

Imai wasn't sure what was turning this stomach more at the moment, however: the images that the stories Asai had uncovered were filling his head with, or the prospect of calling his friend in the NPSC—if "friend" was even the appropriate term in this situation. God, he could use a cigarette. Ever since he'd been put on suspension, this quitting thing had been falling apart faster than a sandcastle at high tide.

"You know what?" Imai growled, reaching into this pocket. "This was a bad idea. I just don't have much of an appetite today—"

With reflexes lightning quick, Asai's fingers closed around Imai's wrist before he could open his fist and let the first thousand-yen note hit the table. Swallowing his pride and embarrassment, Imai took the hint and put the money back in his coat, all while his partner fixed him a steady stare, eye to eye. In Asai-speak, that meant he meant it when he said, "You take care of yourself, Sempai."

* * *

The warm salty breeze rustling the banana palms and bringing with them the sweet smell of jasmine usually lulled Kiyoko into a sense of peace and security, but today that air seemed to carry with it an intangible sense of doom. All morning she had felt a tingling like a premonition, a subtle bristling in her environment as though this tropical paradise which had been her refuge these past few months had suddenly turned against her.

She needed a drink to settle her nerves. A nice glass of white wine with which to enjoy her copies of this morning's _Asahi _and _Yomiuri Shimbun, _graciously printed out for her by the hotel staff, while she took in the calming _hush _of the tide against the coral reef below the balcony. When the waiter came with a glass of chilled Chardonnay, she thanked him, waited for him to turn, and took a long and generous first sip. The young man had not lied: It was indeed an excellent vintage, and just what she needed to reclaim her day.

She should have known that peace was a false one, however. It was not long after that a figure in a light, white linen suit approached the chair opposite hers at the table, and said in a flawless and polite Japanese she had grown unaccustomed to hearing here "Do you mind if I sit?"

There was a point when Kiyoko had thought she would never hear that voice again. Nay, she had _prayed _she would never hear it again. But as she looked up from under the wide brim of her hat, and into Muraki Kazutaka's gently smiling face, pale as porcelain even under the Bahia sun, it was not rage or disbelieving denial that came over her, but the uneasy peace of acceptance. The knowledge that, now that he was here, she could no longer run. There was nothing left for her to do but face him.

Which was not to say that she didn't feel the icy fingers of fear close about her. She took another long drink to steel herself.

"I suppose I should have known better than to think I could get away from you," she said, affecting her most imperious posture. "The ends of the earth are nothing to a man of your means, are they?"

"The _moon _would not be out of my reach, my dear Kaede," he reposted with a light chuckle that she knew well enough by now not to take at face value. Nor the easy way he crossed one leg over the other, and swept a bit of dust from his trousers with a casual gesture. "But truly you were not difficult to find. Choosing a resort in the middle of the Brazilian wilderness was a wise choice, but you do not wander far from the comforts you've become accustomed to. Choosing a _luxury _resort was what gave you away."

Kiyoko turned away from him. "You should not have wasted your time and energy. I did all what you asked of me with the boy."

"You did," he agreed.

"I never breathed a word to the authorities of your involvement. I'm sure with your connections that is easily verified."

"It was. But that is not why I came here. I would have had no interest in pursuing you after your performance in my little production was concluded, Kaede, except for the fact that you _did _speak to someone of me. A different kind of authority, albeit with limited powers in this world. Do you wish to deny it?"

Kiyoko paled. Even now her conversation with the two shinigami seemed like something out of a dream. How readily she had accepted their existence, after Oriya had related his own experiences with them to her. After learning of the Fujisawa boy's resurrection by Muraki's hands, from what should have been impossible injuries to correct, it was no stretch. They had seemed like ordinary men, those shinigami; and she—so full of hatred for this man sitting across from her now, and disgust for what he had done, how he had so perverted the natural order of things, and dragged her unknowingly into it—had been so eager at the time to tell them everything she knew. Anything at all that might cause Muraki Kazutaka one ounce of the trouble he had caused her.

She must have known then the consequences would eventually catch up with her. But that knowledge had faded over time and distance. She supposed it had been too much to hope they would find and kill Muraki before this day arrived, but she had hoped nonetheless.

"I suppose it's no good asking how you know about that," Kiyoko said. "And now you've come to find retribution for my discussing you with your enemies?"

Muraki smiled a little at that; when he looked up at her, however, there was no trace of amusement in those icy gray eyes, not even the grudging sympathy he had once afforded her as an adopted relation of Oriya.

Now there was nothing in him but cool hatred as he explained to her: "No. If that was all you had done, I would not have bothered with all this. There was nothing about me that you could have revealed to them that they did not already know. But you told them more than you admit to, Kaede. You violated my most sacred trust. You told them about _her_, and that is an act I simply cannot overlook."

Kiyoko couldn't help herself. She laughed. Much to Muraki's displeasure—and that, alone, _almost _made it worth it.

"_That _is your reason? That's what made you come halfway around the globe to hunt me down—because I told them about _Ukyou_?"

"You had no right—"

"Oh, you want to get started on _rights,_ do you? That's rich! You who forced your abomination upon me, who made me a sacrifice to my peers and my own government so you might play out your little cloak-and-dagger games with the Land of the Dead—who shat on your supposedly sacred friendship with Oriya for the same ends, forced him to bear your burdens, clean up your messes—and that poor boy, that shinigami lad who came to me afterwards, told me how you had cursed him, _tortured _him, and who knows what else the boy chose not to mention in polite company—you, the _monster _responsible for all this, you _dare _speak of _rights?_"

She laughed again. Laughed _at _him, at this sad and loathsome farce of a man who now thought he deserved her sympathies, laughed in triumph at the fury that had implanted itself on his colorless face, and emptied her glass.

"By that look on your face, I take it there are some things even _you _didn't know I knew," she sneered. "It's a pity your half-brother didn't kill you when he had the chance. When I think of all the lives which may have passed in peace if you had never seen your eighteenth year—"

"Now you speak of things you truly have no knowledge of."

But she had affected him, shaken his resolve. She could see that through the brittleness of his smile, and it brought her a little solace. She remembered still the fury in him the last time she had mentioned his brother, how she had feared he might break her wrist, his grip had been so tight. He dared not do that here. "What difference does it make? You've come to kill me, an inevitability that I suppose I have been anticipating in one way or another since you darkened my doorstep in Kumamoto. You said it yourself: I can no longer hide behind the Mibu name. I cut all ties when I escaped from that den of iniquity. I accept my fate, even if the only crime I am guilty of in your mind is speaking your fiancee's name. I can only ask that you do me the courtesy due our shared history, and make it quick.

"So. What did you have in mind? A snap of the neck? Gunshot to the heart?"

That brought the shadow of amusement back to his lips. "Nothing so ostentatious. I'm afraid you've already sealed your doom with that glass of Chardonnay, Kaede. You may believe yourself so enlightened to my ways, but I'm willing to bet you did not notice your drink was spiked with a synthetic aconitine that works especially quickly. And how would you notice? Tasteless, odorless—the only effects you would feel are easily confused with the effects of alcohol. A slight numbing sensation in the extremities, a gradual decrease in heart rhythm. But that will change just before its saturation in the bloodstream becomes irreversible.

"Ah, ah!" he warned her when she made a move to get up. "Sit, and enjoy what time you have left. Even if you managed to alert the staff, you would be dead before they could deduce your symptoms, let alone provide an antidote."

Kiyoko settled back in her chair, gripping the armrests in a suddenly weak grip. It was merely adrenaline, she tried feebly to convince herself, just more of his mind games. She must not let them frighten her. But she had never known Muraki to lie. Allow those around to him to extrapolate falsehoods, certainly, but not lie. Her eyes flicked to the empty glass of wine she had been so eager to consume, and she cursed her weakness, her predictability. He was right about one thing: In the end, she had no one to blame for her demise but herself.

A calm came over her despite her fear. This must be what those condemned to the guillotine felt as they were led to the platform, this queer acceptance that whatever happened now was out of their hands, and there was something freeing, even comforting, in that knowledge.

It brought a grin to Kiyoko's lips, a laugh from deep within her dying body. "You're a coward after all, Muraki. Don't you know poison is a woman's weapon?"

"I thought it was appropriate. A faithless method for a faithless individual."

And there it was. There was what all this had arisen from. Well, Kiyoko had nothing left to lose. . . .

"A _whore,_ you mean. After all, that's all women are to you, isn't it? You've made no secret of your revulsion towards me, for what I was, what I did to survive. What your mother was in your mind, and all those poor victims Oriya covered up out of his twisted love for you.

"But don't delude yourself that your precious fiancee is any different. That she's somehow purer, more innocent than the rest of her sex."

"You don't know anything about her."

But the words came hissing through Muraki's clenched teeth, no longer the calm, rational arguments of a man of science. Kiyoko's heart began to race at a disturbing rhythm, but she took a certain queer pleasure from the rush, and from the abject hatred in Muraki's eyes. It brought a smile to her lips in the end, a defiance to the tremble in her limbs. The onset of the final climax was indistinguishable from the thrill of landing one last wounding blow:

"I know the only one she needs protection from is you," Kiyoko said. "She's no different from any other woman, Muraki, and one day you will have to confront that fact. If I can take satisfaction from anything, it's that even after I'm dead, that thought it going to haunt you to the end of your days."


	5. Caught in the sudden shower

**Note:** This story was calling me, so I came out of my break this 5 de Mayo weekend to bring you chapter 5. If anyone's wondering why the rating got bumped up to M for Mature, this installment, and particularly the addition of a new character, should finally start to deliver on the level of depravity you've come to expect from Yami no Matsuei. I'm happy to say it won't be going down any time soon. Tiny disclaimer: Some of the proper nouns mentioned here have multiple official and unofficial spellings.

A big, beach blanket thank you to everyone who has been reading so far, and for all the supportive comments. May the Fourth be with you all! \:D/

* * *

Muraki left Komatsu Kiyoko, late Mibu Kaede, sitting as he had found her, facing the sea, newspapers and a glass of wine beside her.

An empty glass now. He was certain no one would think to check it for poison, just as he was certain, as he strode out of the hotel patio, that the waiter would soon forget his face. When the hotel staff finally discovered Mrs. Komatsu's body, they would not be able to revive her, nor would they have any reason to doubt the cause of her death was anything more suspicious than sudden cardiac arrest.

Contrary to what she had believed, he took no pleasure from this kill. It was true Kaede instilled a revulsion deep within him for her work in the Kokakurou. But he had also admired her once, for the old art she kept alive, and for the skill and stunning beauty with which she did it, even if it was in essence a base art, designed to beguile and defraud men by presenting them an unnatural perfection. A contradiction made flesh. A tower of severity and imperious chastity _meant_ to be torn apart and defiled, for the right price.

She had been kind to him once, when he was a grieving high schooler, a newly-made orphan, and that could not be overlooked. She had allowed him to forget his situation, if only for a little while, and she had been important to Oriya. (This was not a death Muraki was about to confess to his old friend.) Killing Kaede had been an unfortunate necessity, but now that it was over and done with, it did make things. . . .

Simpler.

And as for her attempted assassination of Ukyou's character, Muraki refused to waste even a thought on it. It was because of Ukyou that Kaede had to die, after all—because some time long ago, when he had been a new orphan and grieving, and taken in so generously by the Mibus, he must have let slip her name. Or else Oriya had: After all, there was no reason for Oriya to think an old school mate who just happened to be his friend's fiancee was off-limits in a conversation between pseudo-siblings.

It was _Kaede _who should have known to keep her mouth shut. Yet she had given Ukyou's name to his enemies not in a lapse of caution, but deliberately, knowing that in doing so she would be putting Ukyou in danger.

And in doing so, she had hoped to hurt him.

_On the other hand_, a thread of common sense wormed its way out from the tangled braid of cause and effect and into the light, _no one _coerced _you into taking Fujisawa to her._

It was a while since Fujisawa had crossed Muraki's thoughts. But the fact remained that, without the boy, he would not have had reason to come to Brazil and tie up his own loose ends by such extreme measures. He would not be a fugitive from his own country, and Ukyou left to fend for herself against a couple of shinigami who would stop at nothing to avenge themselves on him.

Which was not to say the project had been a failure. Muraki had, after all, succeeded in proving to all parties involved that he still possessed the power to draw Tsuzuki to him; and though the terms of their parting had been less than ideal, he had made the pivotal move. It was up to Tsuzuki to decide what to do next.

But even in success, Muraki had been sloppy. He regretted using Fujisawa now, if only because he saw in retrospect that he could not control the boy completely. It seemed that at one time, his plan had been much clearer: Heal the boy's grievous injuries and revive him. Prove he, Muraki Kazutaka, possessed a power over death that defied Enma's bureaucracy and even surpassed his grandfather's rather impressive body of work—a power he could apply to Saki's remains and finally enact the revenge that had been robbed him.

He made his first misstep when he involved another person. Like a child eager to show off its accomplishments in hope of praise, he had gone running back to his old university professor, Dr. Satomi.

The way the man went about, one would have taken him for a typical pervert. Satomi never did grasp the finer points of talking to a woman, and he gained a reputation among the coeds as one of _those _men, an otaku whose particular obsession was with the medical. In a way, they were right, but not, Muraki surmised, in the way they had thought.

He had learned early on in his professional relationship with the man that Satomi's tastes were not so mainstream.

Therefore, it should have come as no surprise to him when he returned to his office after leaving the two alone together to find his old professor in the midst of a special examination of their pet project.

Fujisawa was up and alert. He was a quick recoverer, miraculously so for the damage he had taken during and shortly after his death. Much of his memory intact, and therefore his personality, the boy participated in each task placed in front of him with an eagerness, if not sobriety, that was a scientist's dream. If he flinched at all from the scarier tests, the ones involving needles and electrodes and scalpels, he nevertheless accepted them as necessary to his continued existence. What did he really have to fear anyway? He had already died once, and since returning from the grave, pain had not nearly the same effect on him.

But Muraki should have seen it coming, from his history. He should have seen it in Fujisawa's eyes, the way they followed his two handlers behind their backs, the way his breath caught coyly in his throat each time a needle penetrated a vein. The pink tip of his tongue was constantly darting out to wet a corner of his lip, like a snake testing the air for the hormonal signature of prey.

He kept it locked up then, as Satomi examined the prehensility in his replacement fingers. Everything looked normal, the doctor said, the transplants were taking remarkably well, and Muraki had obviously known what he was doing.

"Don't you want to take a look at this leg as well?" Fujisawa had purred. He spread his thighs wider, his knees drawing Satomi in between them. He said through a devilish grin, "It's feeling a bit stiff."

Humor was lost on Satomi, but not his meaning. Even from the hallway beyond, Muraki could see his breath quicken, could hear the sudden rush of blood in Satomi's nervous cough. He could all but smell the desire on the man's breath, if only because he had found himself in a position similar to Fujisawa's more than once as an undergrad.

Unlike Fujisawa, however, he had never shown much enjoyment for the game.

"Tell me where you feel it," Satomi said, poking safely around the boy's knee. But Fujisawa wasn't up for drawing it out. "Higher," he said, "much higher," and, grabbing the professor's hand himself, guided Satomi just where he wanted him: to the heat between his thighs.

Satomi shuddered, a disgusting sight, but it wasn't the professor's beauty or elegance or any semblance of sexual prowess that had Fujisawa grinning from ear to ear. It was the look he saw on Muraki's face as he caught him staring over Satomi's shoulder. Muraki wasn't aware how he looked himself, but to Fujisawa, his expression must have been priceless.

So it was with that in mind that he had to chastise the boy later that night.

"I'm sending you away."

The boy gaped at him as though Muraki had said he was sending him to military school. Granted, military school probably would have appealed to Fujisawa's unhealthy desires for sexual dominance. "Why? Have I done something wrong?"

"You can't keep distracting Dr. Satomi from his research, boy. You might feel like this is all a game, one you're steadily winning, but I assure you it is not."

Fujisawa smiled at that. "I see. Want me all to yourself, huh?"

He would do the same thing to me, Muraki realized then, use me the same way, if I let him. And he certainly could be tempted, if so much were not at stake.

"We've reached a point in the project where we've come as far as we can," he said, ignoring the boy's open question. "Your vital systems are holding steady and your mind is as fully repaired as we could have hoped. More so given the circumstances. There is nothing left to do for you. It's time for Satomi and myself to move on, and you should too."

The smug grin fell. "But you can't do that! There's still so much I can do. I can still assist Satomi-sensei around the lab. I know he wouldn't mind. Just don't send me away somewhere. Not yet. Sensei promised to show me off to the investors next week."

Muraki started at that. "Did he now?" That was the first he had heard of it. And if Satomi was keeping something as important as that from him, what else did his old professor have up his sleeve? "So he was just going to kidnap you for a few days, take you on a nice trip out to the country to meet some colleagues of his? Was that it? Did he think he could pass you off as his own creation? Is that what you want to be seen as, boy, some Frankenstein's monster, cobbled together from rejected pieces? And what did he promise you in return: dinner at a nice restaurant, and afterwards a good fuck at a four-star hotel?"

The idea was laughable. Even if Fujisawa's new limbs did technically come from Satomi's lab, they were only successful because of Muraki's applied genius. And a little black magic. Without him, his old professor wouldn't even have a living sample to show off.

Muraki never did forgive him his temerity. Nor could he say he was sad to see the old man die. After that day, there was no question as to Fujisawa's removal. Just as there was no question in Muraki's mind his old professor would only drag him down if the dead weight of him was not eliminated. One thing Satomi never understood was the need for discretion, and it was ultimately what did him in. He could not understand why the world was never to know about an aberration like Fujisawa, and for that Muraki had no choice. Satomi had to be silenced.

Likewise, Muraki consoled himself, Kaede had brought her fate on herself. She had had a choice, and like his professor before her, she had chosen to speak. Unlike Satomi, however, she had known full well what she was doing, just as she had known her sin could not go unpunished.

* * *

"Wow." Watari blinked behind his round glasses when they told him of Terazuma's altercation with Peacekeeping. "I don't believe it. I mean, I believe what you're saying, but two departments this close to being at all-out war?"

He made a sound of disapproval. In the dark lab, lit only by a few desk lamps and the glow of the computer screen, Natsume and Hisoka exchanged a knowing glance.

"The disturbing thing is what they hit Terazuma with," Hisoka said, watching the scientist carefully for his reaction. "It was explained to us as some kind of coating that's only supposed to affect shinigami bodies. Something about disturbing electrical fields. . . ."

Watari nodded. "Yes, I can see how that might be effective. Ingenious, really. I'm assuming it slows down our healing process to just about zero, too."

"Uh, yeah. Good guess. Hey, Watari?" Hisoka knew he was bombing with this act-casual tactic he and Natsume had agreed upon, but his partner should have known he wasn't a great actor. "You know all those experiments you like to try on us—like potions and such—the ones that don't work out? You don't keep those around, do you?"

"Not the ones with the truly nasty side-effects, no. Those have to be disposed of with the utmost care. Either in the incinerator in the basement, or in the lake of fire. Trust me, you do _not _want to go for a dip in that thing now, no telling what it might do to you." All in an instant it occurred to him what Hisoka was really trying to say, and he sobered. "Wait a sec. If you two are thinking I had anything to do with this—"

"Well, you could have." Natsume, apparently taking it upon himself to play the "bad cop," didn't bother putting it nicely. "I'm not saying you would do anything to intentionally hurt one of us, but you do a lot of sciency stuff for the other departments around here, correct? Isn't it entirely possible Todoroki or someone from Judgment could have come to you with a job, fed you some specifications with a line about what they would _supposedly _be using it for . . . ?"

"I dunno, it's possible!" Watari rubbed a temple. "I worked on a lot of stuff in the early 'eighties I'm kinda hazy on. I dunno why, it's like my mind just pops up with an 'access denied' in big letters across it whenever I try thinkin' 'bout it too hard. But most of the stuff I was working on then were engineering projects, Bon. All this biochemistry hoopla is a hobby I took up to keep things interesting around here. Keep the dendrites limber. If I invented a substance that puts shinigami-plasm in electromagnetic lockdown, you think I was _aiming _for it?"

"It's okay, Watari," Hisoka told him. Anything to bring down the noise level in the room, and not invite anyone who might still be snooping about in the dead of night to come and eavesdrop. "We don't actually suspect you of working against our department."

Well, Natsume had for a little while, but Hisoka thought it best not to mention it. It was nothing personal on his partner's part; just a healthy amount of paranoia, as he was so fond of reminding Hisoka. And this from a guy who had died toward the _end _of the Cold War.

"Well, if I did have a hand in what happened to Hajime—albeit unwittingly," Watari added for Natsume's benefit, "I'd sure as hell like to know about it, too."

"Sorry." That from the young man from Billing. "It's just the chief never invites you to any meetings . . ."

"Tatsumi keeps me up on things on a strictly need-to-know basis. My own insistence. Don't wanna know any more than it's safe to, just in case the old noggin ever gets hacked."

Hisoka was only too glad to change the subject. Hacking brains like computers was not something he wanted to contemplate overly much, especially given Watari's knowledge of computers. And Watari almost sounded like he spoke from experience. "So, what's your news? You said you found something when you were analyzing the slime creature's remains."

"Ah, yes." With an intelligently raised finger, Watari slid himself over to another computer, attached to a very scientific-looking device. "I almost didn't catch it, except 003 kept staring at something after I'd scraped away most of the goo from inside the toaster. Had to run it through several filters before I could see what caught her eye. Man, what I wouldn't give to have owl-sight for a day."

With the touch of a key, he brought the computer out of its hyperspace screensaver, typed in a password, and a circular image not unlike the jumbled insides of a scrambled eukaryotic cell appeared on the screen.

"Funny thing, though. It wasn't actually _in _the shoggoth's remains. Well, to be exact, it _was_, at one point. But at some point it got transferred to the inner wall of Xul. I'm guessing during the botched release process. All that energy produced a kind of photochemical transfer—which explains the blurry quality of some of the details. All the more reason why you really gotta wet the application site thoroughly before you apply those temporary tattoos, am I right?"

He grinned up at each of them in turn, but Natsume was blinking behind his glasses at the screen, trying to focus on the blurry pattern, and Hisoka's expression had gone sour. "It needs some cleaning up, but I don't suppose I need to explain to either of you what you're looking at."

"I think it's pretty obvious," Hisoka agreed. "It's the signature of a demon."

* * *

"A pity things had to end this way. And after everything you'd been through together."

For a moment, a sensation like panic rose up inside Muraki. Standing there against the bougainvillea-draped wall, just waiting for him to pass by, was Fujisawa, back from the dead again. Or, at least, a clever spitting-image. His hair and high school jacket were too red, his complexion too pink, and his eyes, golden brown on the real thing, shone unnaturally bright, like two amber LEDs.

It was those eyes more than anything else that gave him away. "It wasn't that much, to be honest."

"Ah, but I'm sensing you would have liked it to be. Once, long ago. Sure, you were ashamed to admit it—still are—that a mere woman, and a slut at that, could ever arouse such feelings in you. As if your thoughts were ever pure to begin with."

The smooth, sarcastic voice and the cocky posture, on the other hand, were spot-on Fujisawa. Much too much so for comfort. Not only was this impostor probing into gray matter where he was not welcome, Muraki was certain he was being mocked. Neither one of which was to his liking.

"You may leave," he said, refusing to rise to the challenge in the devil's words. "You're not the one I asked to speak with."

"My Master is busy," the other said, "if that's who you were expecting. He sent me instead, so whatever you have to say is going to have to pass through me first."

"Not in that form, it isn't. Change, or we're done here."

When Muraki walked on, the lookalike pushed himself off the wall and started to follow. "Aw, and here I thought you _liked _this shape. Why change out of it so soon? Sure you don't fancy a quick fuck before we get down to business? Just for old-time's sake?

"Or," said the devil, "maybe you'd rather I took _her _shape. I know you didn't hate her as much as your actions would make it seem. I usually don't swing that way, but it might be fun, considering she was your first—"

His wolfish grin was more Fujisawa than Muraki was willing to stand for, and no one, no matter what world he hailed from, had the right to speak to him of his past. In a heartbeat he had the devil by the throat up against the wall, a snarl on his lips and a growl edging up his throat that only the lookalike's momentary flash of fear could keep at bay.

"Change out of that form now," Muraki hissed, "or this negotiation is over and I send you back to Hell the hard way."

Fear gone, the devil's scowl turned defiant. "You dare to give me orders, human? _I _am a grand duke of Hell, commander of twenty-six legions, and _you_ did not summon me here—"

"No, I summoned your master. But since he's decided it's beneath him to take a moment out of his day to speak with me, an old friend and very important potential ally, I'll do with the worm he did send me whatever I damn well please. Wouldn't you do the same, Zepar?"

Whatever retort had been on the tip of the devil's lips, it died when Muraki uttered that name. How simple his kind were. It was almost ridiculous, really. How much power something as minor as a name could have, when uttered by the right person.

"Do you really want to test me?" Muraki said when the devil didn't answer right away. "I'll show you how human I truly am if you don't change out of that body this instant. And if I ever catch you fishing in my thoughts again—"

"Alright, alright." Zepar, duke of Hell, relaxed in Muraki's hold, like a petulant child whose only regret is being caught. "And here I thought you'd like this form. Now I see I was mistaken. Mea culpa."

Any resemblance to Fujisawa vanished as the devil's features shifted and reconfigured themselves before his eyes. That it was Zepar's true form, Muraki very much doubted, but at least he didn't recognize anyone from his own past in the lean, pink-skinned young man leaning against the wall under his grip. His high school uniform became white slacks and a tight t-shirt; Fujisawa's face-framing mop, short blood-red hair that quickly disappeared beneath a fedora.

With this new look, he might just as well have been one of the shapeshifting river dolphins the locals believed in, out in human disguise to catch himself a baby-momma. Which, if Muraki knew anything about this particular demon, wasn't too far from his M.O.

He couldn't help a smirk as he loosened his hold. "Only twenty-six legions?"

"And every one of them in loyal service to Lord Astaroth," Zepar said, straightening his shirt front. "Things have been rather busy down there of late, thanks to that, er, _friend_ of yours. Tsuzuki, I believe his name was? Ever since he won his title in Hell, we've had a nice little space cleaned up and waiting for him; but the longer it sits vacant, the more the major lords try to one-up one another, claim his station for themselves. My Master has more than enough on His plate just trying to keep them from tearing each other's throats out."

"It sounds like it might solve any number of your master's problems if Tsuzuki were to show up for active duty."

Zepar blinked, as if he couldn't believe his ears. "What are you suggesting? Because from what I've been given to understand, Tsuzuki would never agree to the arrangement. Hell, even if he did, _Enma _wouldn't allow it."

"You fear a war with the King of the Dead?"

Zepar lowered his eyes at that. "We have quarrels with enough worlds as it is. Why should we want to add the wrath of Meifu on top of all our other troubles? If anything, we would make them our allies. We serve a similar function, after all."

Hell's function and Meifu's are nothing alike, Muraki thought. Either the dukes of Hell had been given false information, or they were sorely deluded.

"Maybe Enma wouldn't have any say in the matter."

"What do you mean?"

"Tsuzuki is his to command only so long as he can control him. But Tsuzuki is far more powerful than Enma is even aware. If he were to come over to your side, under his own volition and at the height of his strength, it would be at Enma's own peril to try and stop him."

"And who's going to convince Tsuzuki of this, hm? You? Is turning him to the dark side part of your master plan to 'rule the galaxy as father and son'?"

The things Muraki could do to Zepar, he thought. What pains he could inflict on the impudent devil for his insolence. If only he didn't require his aid.

"I am only speaking hypothetically. I don't intend to convince Tsuzuki of anything where your master or his realm are concerned," Muraki told him. "Tsuzuki rightly belongs to me."

"Ah. I see now. You just want our help in getting him. But what do we get in return, hm? And don't say souls. We get plenty of those already. Most of them come from the death bureaus themselves. But I can think of one thing you could offer that would make my Master forget Tsuzuki even existed." The devil's wolfish eyes narrowed in glee. "Yourself."

Muraki couldn't help but return the grin. "Me? I'm flattered, truly, that Lord Astaroth would consider me an equal prize."

"We are aware of your heritage—on both sides. Your skill set could be just as useful to us as Tsuzuki's. More so, if you were more willing to comply."

"You mean, I would be easier to control."

"What are you talking about? You would be a prince among demons. You would command armies! Far more than twenty-six legions, I guarantee that."

But control was truly the crux of it, Muraki thought, allowing himself a quiet chuckle. No matter what power he was granted, no matter how he might use such an alliance to shape the world as he saw fit, he would remain Astaroth's slave. And that was a condition he could never consent to. "You must know I have always refused your master's offer, nor have I any intention of changing my answer now. I will not work for Hell as its servant, not now or ever."

Zepar looked up at him out of the corner of his eye. "You think yourself above us demons—better?"

"I simply value my freedom above all else, including my soul."

"But _not _including Tsuzuki. Is that not why I'm here?"

"Your master owes me that much. After all, we are both after the same thing."

"Really? The way I see it, you're asking us to work at cross-purposes."

"Help me find Tsuzuki," Muraki tried through his teeth, "and Astaroth will have more reward than he will know what to do with. Enma would never admit it, but without Tsuzuki his administration is weak. After all, my grandfather, a mere mortal, almost brought it down single-handedly." By the devil's silence, he must have been on the right track. "The Throne of Yomi is too tempting a prize to resist, even for a king of Hell. Think of the power Astaroth could wield—how many millions of souls' fates he might sway with a snap of his fingers. I think he will agree the trade is more than generous."

Zepar laughed again. It was clear Muraki was not the only one whose patience was wearing thin. "Oh, Dr. Muraki," he joked in a flirtatious tone that barely disguised his repulsion. "Your lack of respect is so . . . _human. _My Master has been _more _than generous, extending you many favors and rarely asking any in return. It's clear you have a—_hah_—special place in His heart, considering you can talk about Him like that and no one's smote you yet. Still, I think it's about time you started paying your bills before you ask for more credit. Don't you?"

"Our deal was already negotiated."

"And I am here to renegotiate it. Your mouth, as the saying goes, is writing checks your ass can't cash. First you say you can deliver Tsuzuki, though your record on that is less than encouraging. Now you want our help finding him so you can keep him for a pet, and what are we to get from the deal? A war with Enma? For something he gives us anyway?"

"If your master is content to amuse himself with second-hand souls, to yield his own authority to Enma's judgment, then by all means: Ignore my requests. Continue to sneak about in the shadows, grasping for what scraps fall from the judgment gods' tables. You forget I have had dealings with Astaroth in the past myself, without any pesky middlemen standing in my way, and he never struck me as the type to enjoy playing second fiddle. Am I wrong, Zepar? You stand here as his representative, and I have yet to hear a 'no' out of you."

If that was to be his answer, surely the devil would have left long ago. No, Muraki still had a reason to remain confident this meeting was not in vain. He might still hear what he desired.

Perhaps reading his thoughts again, Zepar sobered. "I have been told to inform you of the revised price for fulfilling this 'favor'. As compensation for aiding in the capture of and ceding His rights to Tsuzuki, my Master wants this in return."

And so saying, he handed Muraki a folded piece of paper. Anxiety rose up with Muraki for a moment, and then dissipated so suddenly upon reading Astaroth's one demand it took all his self-control not to laugh in Zepar's face. That simply would not do, to let on that he found this to be the most one-sided business contract he had ever entered into, with himself the sole benefactor.

For if Zepar, or for that matter, Astaroth, could ever peer that deeply down into his soul, they would see that was the one thing Muraki could never give, because it was the one thing he vowed, no matter what ungodly acts he had already committed, to never bring into the world.

And therefore, he had nothing whatsoever to lose. "Tell your master, he has himself a deal."

* * *

Contrary to popular belief, Hell was not a 24/7/365 orgy of torment, of damned human souls wailing and gnashing their teeth while low-level demons stirred them in cauldrons of lava with large paddles, or flayed them to the nerves and raked them over hot coals, or buggered them with roasted tubers.

That is, there was that element, but there were also the open spaces, the majestic vistas, where the dragons and manticores released from their bridles could be seen frolicking in the sulfurous springs. Orchards more splendid and macabre than any science fiction illustrator could imagine, where the spawn of demons too lowly to ever rise into the ranks ate of the perverse native fruits and each other. There was a natural beauty here, in every crack in the earth that revealed the blood of fire beneath like a fresh, gaping wound; and in the proud jutting of the cinder cones into the darkened sky, spilling plumes of liquid gold down their trembling flanks while the storm clouds caressed them with fingers of lightning.

And in the center of it all, rising taller than any volcano in the land, the shining black ziggurat that was the fortress and urban heart of Hell, bristling with spiked battlements, monument in stone and metal and frozen fire to the glory of her kings whose power was said to be rivaled only by the angels themselves (and who had seen head or feathered tail of them in more than four millennia?).

There beneath the soaring basalt and obsidian columns, with their carved grotesqueries, Zepar felt most at home. The demonic legions tipped their heads to him when he went by. Some of the persuasion even swooned; his influence was not limited to human women and pederasts alone. The form he had chosen for himself from Muraki Kazutaka's mind pleased him. Though he had never the fortune to meet the boy named Fujisawa while he was alive, or even during his short second-life, Zepar could sense the brash self-confidence and reckless sexuality that had molded the features to which he molded his skin. And which, he sensed, may have led Fujisawa to both of his deaths. It was a form that was truly worthy of Zepar, one he could use to great advantage.

When he pushed open the doors of the great library, Malphas and Halphas were there to greet him. They must have locked on to his signature as soon as they caught a whiff of him being back in Hell.

"So, the Grand Duke returns from the realm of the living victorious, I presume," said Halphas, his stork-like legs keeping easily with Zepar's quick pace.

The devil in question sighed as though he were already bored of the two aviforms. He did not break his stride. "As victorious as one could hope, I suppose. But time will tell. Dr. Muraki is a slippery little mortal who seems to think he can outwit us with loopholes and empty promises."

"Lord Astaroth was wise to send someone of your abilities to negotiate with him." A gurgle of corvine humor colored Malphas's words. "Tell me: Did the doctor agree to the new conditions?"

The acrid scent of that slip of paper burning in his palm, sealing the deal, was perfume to Zepar's senses. But he told the two: "Now, you know the first to hear the answer to that from my lips will be our Master. The rest of you must wait. But tell me what you wish to, and make it quick. I have more important places to be."

As they walked abreast of Zepar, the two informed him of the state of their fortifications—the repairs that had been made to ramparts, ancient tunnels that had been rediscovered, remapped, and reinforced. The stockpiling of ammunition was coming along thanks to the work of Stolas, and Furfur assured them the cavalry's stables were well taken care of. A demon loyal to King Paimon had been caught snooping, but Malphas assured them he had been sent away laboring under the implanted delusion that the rockets he had glimpsed were fireworks rather than missiles.

All that remained was for Zepar and his legions to ensure they had the numbers on their side, so that when the time came to strike, their Master could not fail. And were they sure that he could deliver on that promise and deal with Muraki at the same time?

"Ye of such little faith," he chuckled at them. "Trust that I have the situation in hand. I am going to visit a potential ally in our cause right now."

As they reached the appropriate portal, he turned and bid his comrades adieu. Then pushed backwards through the double doors, making sure their eyes were on him as he closed the doors in their faces. Their curiosity was a palpable thing to him, but he could not reveal his secret weapon just yet. Not when it was still in its unfinished state.

So, this is where the Master keeps embarrassments, Zepar thought as he turned to look at the room. Ancient scrolls lay in their honeycombs along the walls. A thick layer of dust stood testament to how recently they had been disturbed, let alone read. The air inside was oppressive, heavy and dry, and no breeze blew through it. Moisture control for the delicate books. But more importantly, what made this room such an appropriate prison for one who drew his strength from winds and ocean currents. For such a one, that deprivationwas more effective than any bars or chains.

Zepar found his mark near a window at the back of the room. He sat in what looked to be a rather uncomfortable chair, his thin body hunched like an invalid's. His skin had gone white, as had his hair, which hung overgrown over his eyes. White as an old man's, thought Zepar, though he knew the human man it had belonged to was relatively young, certainly no older than thirty when he had been . . . appropriated.

A young high school teacher of Christian history, and a pederast, if what Zepar heard could be believed. Well, an ephebophile at the very least, who preferred to pluck his flowers just as they had opened their petals wide enough to begin seducing the pollinators—not so unusual for someone of such fervent religious convictions. They tended to overcompensate for their own weaknesses of the flesh with more exuberant shows of piety, if Zepar had learned anything from all the supposedly chaste men and women of various holy orders whom he had visited over the centuries.

Which only made it that much sweeter when they succumbed to his traps. Manipulation was the game he had been born to play, and he performed his duty with more relish than some of his associates were comfortable with.

But none of them could fault him for kicking a man when he was down. He was, after all, only obeying his nature. And the man before him was no different, or else he would not have landed himself in this personal hell.

"My, how the mighty have fallen," Zepar sighed in the Fujisawa boy's voice.

The other would not give him the satisfaction of meeting his eyes. "Did you only come to gloat, Zepar? That hardly seems like a worthwhile way to spend your time."

"Don't sell yourself short," he said, kneeling by the other's feet. "You're an inspiration to us all, although by 'inspiration' I mean cautionary tale. Truly it pains me to see you like this. A great commander of demons, defeated by a mortal and abandoned by all but his most foolish legions. And now, trapped in a weak human vessel that can barely support him. Why, it's falling apart before my eyes."

Zepar gripped his thigh with fervent sympathy, and felt the stiffening of muscles beneath them. Not with the arousal he was used to, perhaps, but with contempt. "You look positively drowned," he pressed on, "not that that deathly complexion isn't something a little blush couldn't liven right up, but it's more than a tad poetic. Wouldn't you say, Focalor?"

The once-mighty destroyer of ships and drowner of men glared up at him; but his vessel's doe eyes did little to convey the murderous intent behind them. He growled, though it seemed through lips made of sand. "What do you want?"

"Tch. . . . Is that any way to greet a friend?"

Focalor chuckled, a weak, raspy sound that Zepar was surprised didn't give way to coughing. "The day you come to me as a friend is the day the gates of Heaven yawn open and welcome us all back inside. Say what you came to, and get out."

"And leave you to mope in your misery?"

Zepar smirked to himself. He glimpsed a thread of memory and tugged at it, remolding himself in compliance with it. He liked the way he felt in this new shape almost as much as the last one—straight of shoulder, an intelligent and aristocratic aloofness on a face he knew to be beautiful without looking in any mirror. The pious face of a decidedly _im_pious seventeen-year-old student body president.

A name came to him like something whispered on a wave. Izuru . . . ? Yes, that was it. Okazaki Izuru.

"Forgive me, _Sensei._" It wasn't difficult to sound genuinely contrite with this face. "I wouldn't want us to get off on the wrong foot, not when our desires are so similar."

The reproduction wasn't exact, but surely it was close enough. If Focalor seemed surprised to see the Okazaki boy standing before him, however, the only indication he gave was a slight flaring of his nostrils. "Perhaps you'll allow me to start over in a body you were more intimate with," Zepar wheedled. "After all, you were inside it for a time yourself, in more ways than one."

First, if rumors were to be believed, he'd shared it with Okazaki's soul, and seduced the boy's teacher with it (a despicable thing for a devil of Focalor's convictions, no doubt, but they all whored themselves out for their ultimate designs when they needed to). Then, when Focalor had possessed and animated the drowned corpse. He might have been destroyed with it as well, if he had not hidden a portion of his self in the professor before Tsuzuki Asato put his first choice of vessel, and the chapel around him, to the torch.

"If only I had gotten to that boy first," Zepar mused while he idly massaged the other's calf, "I would have granted his heart's desire in the blink of an eye, and no one would have had to suffer for it. Well, except for the boy and his beloved professor, that is. I certainly wouldn't have used them as bait to catch a fish I knew I couldn't fry."

He lowered his voice, and peered up at Focalor from under his lashes. The better to twist the knife in. "_I'm _not the one whose slap-dash plan to ensnare Tsuzuki Asato entailed possessing a half-rotten corpse."

That got a rise out of Focalor. Or at least would have if his vessel were in any shape to show it. "Does this stroll down memory lane have a point," the other devil growled, "or have you merely come to throw my failures in my face?"

Zepar laughed. "I suppose your failures are the reason I'm here. It seems our Master is forgiving after all. For you have been offered a chance to redeem yourself in the eyes of our Lord and all your colleagues and the small-folk of Hell. It's very simple, really. In challenging Tsuzuki, you went against Lord Astaroth's explicit wishes. But swear yourself to the cause, renew your vows of loyalty, and when our Master sits the throne as Supreme Ruler of all Hell, you shall be richly rewarded. What's that human expression? All boats get raised by the tide? When the tide is ours, of course. Join us in it and everything that was yours shall be again: lands, chattel, shares in souls. And, of course, armies, titles, and the respect of your colleagues that has taken so much damage."

"Just as my patience would be rewarded with a return to Heaven—if I only waited fifteen hundred years? Forgive me if I sound skeptical, Zepar, but if I have learned anything from my brush with abject destruction, it is to trust in only what can be attained with certainty, and what can be attained now."

"Then you have truly learned nothing." Zepar let out a long-suffering sigh. "Is the soul of the professor whose body you stole still in there?"

"The man is dead," Focalor growled.

"Ah. In that case, you should see yourself as a great opportunity. No one knows for sure how long a human vessel can survive intact without its original soul. I'm sure devils in training will come from across the land to measure the rate of your vessel's decomposition. How many licks _does _it take to get down to the bare bones?" Zepar shook his head. "A pity for you that you could not have picked a body that was a little stronger to begin with."

"As Surgatanus did?" Focalor asked him coldly.

A chill went down the back of Zepar's neck. It was a sensation he was unused to feeling—or, at least, unused to feeling as anything other than a pleasant sensation. Surgatanus was the reason Astaroth had urged them to leave Tsuzuki be: a terrifying example for all of them, of the consequences of underestimating one's target. Of reaching blindly for power, without thinking how that power might be used against one.

"Surgatanus was a fool," Zepar said through his teeth, as he had a thousand times. Like a snake who had swallowed what it could not digest, "He paid the price for his pride."

Yet Zepar was no closer to making himself believe it. Before Surgatanus, he would have done the same thing, given the chance. They had not known until after their colleague's utter destruction that shinigami were capable of possessing such weapons, or that Enma had such power at his command.

But a grin slowly made its way through the Okazaki boy's meek exterior as a thought occurred to Zepar. "But perhaps there is a way we can get you a stronger body after all. A human body, still, but one more hale than that pitiable corpse you're riding. You could regain the respect of your peers, and avenge yourself on Tsuzuki Asato and his compatriots at the same time."

"Don't waste your breath," Focalor muttered. "Even if I were back to my full strength, Tsuzuki is off limits."

"I didn't say we would _destroy _him," the other sighed. "Christ, brother, it's a wonder you ever convinced the Okazaki boy to take your deal with your lack of imagination. What is it with devils like you who think revenge means only one thing: the utter obliteration of your enemy? How can your enemy appreciate what you're doing to him and how can you enjoy his suffering if he's no longer around?

"Take it from me," Zepar continued, "there are much more effective ways of getting your point across, ways which are infinitely more satisfying in the long run. Never underestimate the power of desire and guilt. You want Tsuzuki to suffer? Don't go after him. Go after those he cares about."

"Explain."

At least now he had Focalor's attention. Finally, they were getting somewhere. "Surgatanus never did collect on his contract."

What little rush of excitement Zepar had felt from Focalor dissipated at that. "I fail to see what good the soul of a dead little girl could do my situation."

"What? No, I'm not talking about the Otonashi girl." Truth be told, Zepar had forgotten about her. "Look. Surgatanus was destroyed before he could remove his contract from its host. Which means it is still written in flesh. And standing there, gaping open, where anyone with the wherewithal to find it can enter."

Zepar grinned. He could sense the other's doubts, faint suspicions that to agree would be to walk into a trap, but they did not worry him. Focalor was running out of options, which made him a desperate man.

And if there was anything Zepar understood, it was desperate men. "Don't you think it's time you and I took a look behind Door Number Three?"


	6. Our host of heavenly kings

From her high perch behind an elevated and truly monumental mahogany desk, the justice of the Internal Affairs branch of the Judgment Division gazed down at Tatsumi through narrow glasses, and said in a voice as cold and impenetrable as a glacier, "I'm sorry, Chief Tatsumi, but after hearing your testimony, I fail to grasp what it is you expect me to do."

Holding his breath and counting to ten had never worked in the past, and it certainly would not work now. It took everything Tatsumi had to measure his words and his tone carefully, lest the slightest whiff of anger or frustration come across as a mark of bias or knee-jerk impulse, and therefore throw his entire statement into doubt and suspicion.

Yet in his afterlife he had dealt with few characters as obstinate as this one, and his patience was flagging under the strain. He supposed it was a little taste of what it was like for others to deal with him; only the safety of those under his command rarely hinged on monetary allowances.

"What I would suggest," he said, matching her tone, "is that Judgment take disciplinary action against these two Peacekeeping officers, preferably in the form of temporary suspension pending a performance review. They have shown my department and its employees, not to mention the good work we seek to do, contempt with their actions; and moreover, inflicted grievous injury on one of my agents—behavior, may I remind you, which your department would find out-of-order and cause for immediate and severe reprimand if exhibited by any members of my staff against another division. Nor would I find fault with such a decision. I merely ask that you hold the Peacekeeping Division to the same professional level of standards to which you hold Summons."

"Those same standards which allow you to file a complaint about my agents without giving either them or their chief a chance to defend their actions?"

Tatsumi barely managed to disguise his feelings as he glanced over at the newcomer.

Chief Todoroki, head of Enma-cho's security forces, was arguably the more pleased of the three to be there. A serious and solid brick of a man whom more than one shinigami over the decades had compared to Mishima Yukio post-physical transformation, it was not often Todoroki showed a trace of humor or anything approaching pleasure. At least not the way most human beings displayed it. So Tatsumi had cause to be concerned when he detected the faintest tug of a grin on the man's lips.

"Ah, Chief Todoroki," the justice said. "Perhaps you can clarify these rather serious allegations made against members of your staff. Do you deny that they attacked Agent Terazuma while he was conducting a summons, as Chief Tatsumi claims?"

The chief of Peacekeeping straightened. "I do not deny it. However, I think it necessary to mention my agents acted in self-defense. One of my men had just been physically attacked and threatened by Agent Terazuma, so his partner took the actions she deemed appropriate to protect him from further harm, just as she was trained to do. She had no way of determining whether this Summons officer was just showing his fangs—" There: an unmistakable grin at the decidedly personal swipe at Terazuma. "—or whether he posed a real and present danger to her partner's well being. The situation forced her to act, and I believe she did so admirably."

"By poisoning Agent Terazuma with a toxin Summons was never made aware of," Tatsumi reminded him, "a toxin _specifically designed, _Chief Todoroki, to attack a shinigami's physical manifestation on a fundamental level. Need I even ask against whom that toxin was really meant to 'protect' your agents, or what the true purpose of their following Agents Terazuma and Kannuki was that night?" The other rolled his eyes, but Tatsumi pressed on: "Do you deny, Chief, before a representative of His Augustness, the Great King Enma, that your agents interfered in an official Summons investigation, potentially endangering dozens of innocent human lives, because you ordered them to spy on my department?"

"Of course I deny ordering them to interfere—though, again, I don't see how one can _fault_ my officers for their vigilance and their determination to bring the rogue agent, Tsuzuki Asato, to justice. And while we're on the subject of Agent Kannuki." Todoroki turned to the justice of the court. "Let the record show that one of my officers was wounded by her in the same incident—"

"I hardly think whatever injuries Agent Agrippina sustained are comparable to Terazuma's."

"And I hardly think it matters whether my officer suffered a few scrapes and bruises or had to be revived. She was assaulted just the same. Maybe I should be filing a complaint against Ms. Kannuki. Unless you want to argue your own agents share none of the blame for the incident because they 'didn't start it'. Oh, wait. One of them did."

Tatsumi bit down on the retort that instinctively bubbled up from within him. In Todoroki's eyes he was no better than a child, in his age at death and lack of experience in life, and in his position as chief of a department. It would do him no good to raise his voice or resort to petty insults in front of an audience, and prove the man correct; right now he had a duty to his coworkers to keep Summons above reproach. Their guilt by association with Tsuzuki had damaged their reputation enough.

"I can't speak for Ms. Kannuki," he started again when he could do so in a calmer fashion, aware of both their gazes on him. "But I can reiterate the main facts: Peacekeeping threatened the order Summons was established to maintain in the living world when two of its agents acted to obstruct one of our investigations. And secondly," he said while fixing Todoroki a steady stare, "the use of an illegal weapon on one of Summons' agents—"

"Objection, your honor. The anti-personnel toxin Mr. Tatsumi refers to has been cleared by King Enma himself for use in the field. In part because of its impotency if accidentally coming into contact with a living person."

"Yet Summons was never made aware of it. You make it sound as though it is so common every Peacekeeping agent is equipped with a vial, but we could find no mention of it in official records."

Todoroki turned to him. "Because the toxin's existence is classified. Do you honestly think a weapon designed to affect shinigami at our most basic level would be filed in some public database where any shinigami could read of it? Imagine the havoc it could wreak throughout Enma-cho if it fell into the hands of someone who had not undergone the same rigorous training my officers receive.

"I need not remind your honor," he said, now to the justice, "that Tsuzuki Asato is a loose cannon that doesn't just pose a threat to the world of the living. He is an unusually powerful shinigami who has displayed a quick temper and weak grasp of reality many times in the past already. All that's needed to turn him against King Enma and this institution is a little push, and the longer he remains out there, unapprehended, and where we have no control over his movements, the greater the chances he receives that little push. It's happened before. _I'm _here to ensure it doesn't happen again."

"That isn't entirely accurate," Tatsumi began. "Tsuzuki did not willfully attack the Judgment Bureau—"

"All the more reason why we can't be too careful. If Tsuzuki was careless enough to allow his vessel to be possessed by a devil of Hell, there is no telling what other dangerous mistakes he might make so long as he doesn't have the accountability of his office looming over him. Or chiefs willing to clean up his messes for him.

"Now, given that track record—which my colleague knows he cannot deny—" And how painfully true that was, for Tatsumi dared not speak up against it lest he lose what composure he managed to still hold on to completely. "—and since all that stands between Tsuzuki's recklessness and the sanctity and order of this world is my division, should my men and women not have the most advanced, most effective tools at their disposal? Chief Tatsumi speaks as though this were a matter of ethics, and on that we agree: It would be unethical to send my agents into the field without those tools simply because they are effective."

"A point I think is well made," said the justice. "We in the Hall of Judgment agree: Capturing Tsuzuki is a priority of the highest order. Nor does it appear your agents were out of order, Chief Todoroki, when they defended themselves in the course of carrying out their mission."

She turned to Tatsumi, and the rebuttal that had been on the tip of his tongue died there. "Your complaints have been duly noted, Chief Tatsumi, though we will not be pursuing disciplinary action against Agents Agrippina and Keijou at this time. You would do well in the future to keep your officers in line, Chief. It is the opinion of this court that Agents Terazuma and Kannuki are at fault for jeopardizing a mission of national security, but in light of Mr. Terazuma's injuries, we believe sufficient punishment has been meted out."

A fancy way of saying he got what he deserved. Tatsumi turned to see Todoroki watching him openly. Hands clasped behind his back and chin held high, he did not smile; but there was a sparkle in his eyes that said as clearly as anything he was enjoying this. That this would teach Tatsumi to challenge his authority, to believe that now he was chief in name it made one iota of difference in the grand pecking order of Juuohcho. Only once before had Tatsumi wanted so utterly to murder another human being, and Muraki was a unique case. Todoroki would only come back for more, and no doubt come back just as smug.

But even siccing his shadows on Todoroki would do nothing to allay Tatsumi's shame. As a division chief, he had a duty to defend those in his charge, and he had failed to do even that much.

"Unless there is some other matter you two wish to address, this hearing his adjourned."

It wasn't exactly an invitation. When both chiefs had agreed there was nothing else, the justice turned to the komatora seated in the box below her, who banged his gavel stone on its sounding block. A clear enough signal to the two that they would do well not to linger.

Todoroki was rather less restrained when he was out of the justice's line of sight.

"Did you really think you could win, Tatsumi?" he said when they were out in the hall, and the background noise of shinigami and demons and mortal souls waiting to be called to their various hearings could disguise the satisfaction in his voice from witnesses. "After all the damage your department's reputation has suffered, the joke your colleagues have made the name of Summons—even before Tsuzuki abandoned his post—did you really think Enma's court would rule in your favor?"

"I believed the truth was sufficient."

Todoroki just "ah"ed at his indignation. "That's the difference between you and me. A more experienced division head would know that around here, truth is what you make it. What you call 'spying,' I prefer to think of as 'transparency,' and it seems Judgment would agree."

"If your idea of transparency is a one-way mirror," Tatsumi spat. "It's all well and good when you're on the side looking in."

"An apt analogy. Maybe you should take it to heart, Tatsumi, and take stock of your own house before you try to burn mine down." He placed a palm on Tatsumi's shoulder as he passed, all the better to rub in the totality of his victory.

And, it seemed to Tatsumi, to imply so much more on a personal level. There could not have been many secrets in their past cases that were beyond Peacekeeping's reach, including the details of the events in Kyoto. It was a low blow on the security chief's part, but effective. Tatsumi's fists tightened at his sides. Even if he dared not use them, there was some comfort to be taken from the prevalence of shadows in the Hall of Judgment, and how simple a turn-around might be if he should find Todoroki alone in one of its darker hallways. . . .

"Do us all a favor, Mr. Tatsumi, and lower your blood pressure before you blow out a light."

Tatsumi did not turn at that distinctive voice. It would have been pointless to look for the Count of the Castle of Candles anyway. Strange how the presence of that man, which usually irritated him in ways only Tsuzuki was able to, came as a relief after his dealings with Todoroki.

"I take it you heard some of that," he said, letting out a breath.

"Enough to get a feel for it." The Count was extremely close by, judging by the clarity of his voice. "And to remind myself just what a pain in the ass Todoroki is, in case I had forgotten it."

A frustrated chuckle escaped Tatsumi at that, though he couldn't decide whether it made him feel better or worse. "What brings you to the Hall of Judgment, Count? Surely not matters regarding the hunt for Tsuzuki."

"Doesn't everything tie back to Tsuzuki in some fashion these days?" But as for Tatsumi's question, he did not answer it any better than that. "I just finished my business, actually. I thought perhaps we could speak somewhere a little less populated, and you could tell me what your little tiff with Todoroki was about."

He followed close as Tatsumi headed toward the far bay of elevators. Once inside one of the cars, Tatsumi related to him as briefly as he could what had happened to Terazuma and Kannuki on their last case, and how his complaint had fared in court. He saw no reason to hold back. Whatever else the Count was, and whatever fault Tatsumi found with his character, he was loyal to Tsuzuki and wanted him returned to Meifu safely—perhaps even more than some of the more resentful employees of Summons did. Despite their mutual animosity in the past, the Count was his ally in this matter. Tatsumi knew he would be a fool not to trust him.

"It seems King Enma's judges have already determined Summons is not to be trusted," he concluded in a growl. "Before Todoroki could even show his face—before I even opened my mouth, the case was already decided."

"Ah," the Count said sympathetically. "Another reason I much preferred this place before Enma put human souls in charge of the administration of Juuohcho's affairs."

"There was ever a time they weren't?"

"Oh, sure. It was long before your time, of course, but judgment used to be the sole domain of kami and demons. At least you knew where you stood with them. Humans fancy themselves so righteous when handed the power of a god; they obsess over rules. Try to bribe one and you'll get yourself slapped with a fine for unethical conduct before you can say 'Just kidding.' Not to mention you're almost guaranteed a ruling against your favor. A demon, on the other hand, would take your bribe, gladly, and then decide whether or not he wanted to completely ignore what you were bribing him for."

"I fail to see much of a distinction," Tatsumi said.

"Oh, it's there, all right. Being human yourself, you probably wouldn't appreciate the finer nuances. What the Judgment Bureau might have gained in efficiency, it lost in a certain kind of integrity. Who can say how many demons of Yomi have defected to Hell over the last century, simply because they believed their contributions would be better respected there."

At the wistfulness of those words, Tatsumi glanced in the Count's direction, even if nothing met his eyes but an inscrutable half-mask and pair of white gloves. In the silence of the elevator, he finally allowed himself to voice what had been weighing on his mind since the first word the Count had spoken to him.

"Do you have any news of the chief? I know if anyone has had contact with him it would be you, and there's a rumor circulating about my staff that Chief Konoe won't be coming back to Summons."

"Are you that eager to go back to being a secretary, Mr. Tatsumi?"

"Don't get me wrong. I had plans to be head of a department someday. But not like this. Not under these circumstances."

The Count took a deep, long breath before answering.

"About the latter thing, Konoe returning to Summons, I cannot say." To his credit, he seemed genuinely sorry to admit that. "But I am assured he is being treated well. As well as could be expected, anyway, for someone whose work prohibits him from seeing visitors. Enma has him on a special project, searching through old case files in a secret location. Even I'm not privy to where it is."

"His Augustness thinks there's something in those cases that will help him find Tsuzuki?"

"That was my understanding. Somewhere, buried in that old information, might be a clue. A location or the name of someone still living who can point Peacekeeping in the right direction."

Then the hunt for Tsuzuki was already farther along than even Tatsumi had feared. If Peacekeeping had this advantage while Summons remained fumbling in the dark, going about their business as usual and merely _hoping _they stumbled across something useful. . . .

Perhaps he should take it as a miracle Tsuzuki had yet to be captured. That even with Konoe working for them, albeit with little say in the matter, Peacekeeping was still desperate enough to take the measures they had against his agents, was testament enough to Tsuzuki's determination to stay hidden.

"You're taking an awful risk," Tatsumi told the Count, "sharing this information with me when my department is being watched so closely. You don't have to, but I appreciate it. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it."

"The way I see it, it's the least I owe Tsuzuki." Was Tatsumi imagining it, or did he detect an echo of his own frustration and stubborn determination in the Count's tone? "This whole 'manhunt in the name of national security' farce can go to hell, as far as I'm concerned, and Enma knows damn well I feel that way. I have nothing to fear or lose in declaring my dissent. I serve too valuable a function to be eliminated. And besides, what more could he do to punish me that hasn't already been done?"

* * *

This job must have been taking its toll on Konoe if he actually looked forward to the arrival of his one visitor each day, the grumpy old kappa somehow bestowed with the unfortunate name of Manju.

But the little creature did give him something to focus on other than the details of Muraki Yukitaka's numerous crimes. When images of strange growths and flesh-ravaging diseases, disembodied limbs or worse hooked up to tubes and wires threatened to overwhelm him, pull him under the careful surface of his conscious mind and drown him in memory, he could look up into that toady face with its perpetual scowl and be grateful to be back in the twenty-first century, in the safety of his underground prison.

Come to think of it, Manju reminded him of one of the alien characters in that space opera Watari was always insisting he watch, the one with the funny grumble and floppy green ears. Surely Enma hadn't intended his jailor to be comic relief, but Konoe had to laugh at _something _after reading through all the ungodly procedures detailed excruciatingly in those files. And if nothing else, a camaraderie had developed between the two of them, albeit a camaraderie born of a shared desire to be anywhere other than where they were. There was no doubt in Konoe's mind the kappa resented him; but even a kappa had to make the most of an undesirable situation.

"What's on the menu today, Manju?" Konoe greeted him.

The kappa all but tossed a schoolgirl's plastic bento box on the desk, kicking up a cloud of dust in the process. "Your lucky day. Cooks made wiener octopuses."

"Not bad." But inside Konoe was grimacing. Perhaps little processed hot dogs cut into fun shapes for children was some kind of kappa delicacy; but as for him, he would wrestle a rokurokubi for some _real _octopus jjigae or a hot Cuban sandwich, smothered in mayonnaise. Or even a salad with fresh, crispy greens for once.

Maybe it was for the best. The case he had been studying before the kappa arrived hadn't left him with the most robust appetite.

"And you?" Manju said. "You do your job while I was gone?"

"Does it look like I have anything else to do?" Konoe gestured around himself at the stacks of files all over the room, only a small portion of which showed signs of being examined. What could the kappa honestly expect? After weeks poring carefully over details he never wanted to read again, Konoe had barely made a dent.

And dark stuff it was, too. Not all of it as bad as what he had seen during his service in the war, but some of it was much worse. Just when he thought he had seen it all, nothing could surprise or disgust him anymore, he picked up a new file, and redefined for himself what it meant to be horrified. There was no abomination the human mind could imagine that Muraki Yukitaka had not tried on living flesh.

"Right. I did come across something useful," Konoe tried, trying to remember where he placed the file. "It seems Tsuzuki spent his last years in Dr. Muraki's clinic in Tokyo. Yukitaka was quite enamored of him by the sound of it—well, the mystery of what kept him alive anyway. That must be when he changed his _raison d'__ê__tre_, and started obsessing over the possibility of achieving immortality. Perhaps there're some clues left in that clinic—"

"Nice try." Manju, who had been listening intently to the chief up until then, turned away. "That clinic didn't survive the war."

"Really? Oh. Well, it was worth a shot."

Apparently he wasn't as good at feigning surprise as he thought. Or else Enma had found something of a mind-reader in the old kappa. A heartbeat later Konoe found himself looking down Manju's beak, the creature's buggy eyes staring deep into his. "Are you trying to pull a fast one, Chief Konoe?"

He seemed to forget Konoe had been a military man, however, and in special operations no less. He didn't spook easy. "Fancy talk for a kappa, Manju. Sounds like you've been doing a lot of hanging around human souls. Would you even know how to identify a 'fast one' if you saw it?"

"We already know Tsuzuki was the catalyst that altered Muraki Yukitaka. You have to try harder than that if you want freedom."

"But I don't know what Lord Enma wants me to find," Konoe said, deflating.

"You will know when you find it."

"If that's the case, and that information is just waiting for anyone reading these files to stumble across it, then I don't see why His Augustness needs me."

"_You _will know," Manju said, emphasis quite clear.

So, what he was looking for was something hidden, in other words, something not explicitly stated anywhere. A proper name or an insinuation that he was somehow supposed to piece together, all because he knew both Tsuzuki and Yukitaka like no one else in Enma-cho.

_It had to be me in this cell. No one else can read between the lines like I can, because no one else was there, day after day. Year after year. No one else knows what it was really like to live under the influence of those two men._

And so I continue to relive my sins, Konoe thought, the words spoken by the goblin at the foot of Enma's throne last autumn seeming more like a prophecy fulfilled than they ever had before. Even in death he could not escape his fate, to work forever against the people he had sought to protect, on the orders of superiors.

"And what if I refuse to read one more file?" What if he found the strength he hadn't been able to in life, and stood up for his principles? Vowed not to do what he knew to be betrayal of the deepest order? "What then?"

"His Highness has ways of making your existence a living hell." To his surprise, Manju looked as though it genuinely pained him to answer that. Doubtless because it meant increasing his responsibilities as well.

"As if this isn't hell already?"

"Tsuzuki is a criminal. Everyone agrees. Would you really sacrifice your own well being to abet him?"

"In a heartbeat."

"What about your secretary? Tsuzuki's partner? The people who answer to you? Do you want them to suffer for your insubordination?"

_Think of your parents, Konoe, your siblings and neighbors. Your old schoolmates, your comrades in His Majesty's service. Your countrymen. Your wife. Your unborn children. What happens to all of them if we fail? Would you let them suffer all the torments of this inane war? Would you condemn them to death or dishonor because you were too afraid to take the appropriate actions? To do what _has _to be done?_

Doing what was right and just never came without strings attached, without some innocent suffering the consequences. Could he in good conscience leave Tatsumi to answer for whatever his decisions wrought? Or Kurosaki? Kannuki or Torii or Fukiya, or any of the rest? Should they have to suffer the shame of his insolence any more than they already had, after all they had done for Summons, and Enma himself?

_After all they've done for Tsuzuki._

And if he agreed to keep trudging ahead, it was Tsuzuki he would damn with the results of his efforts. Konoe could only pray the young man would understand, because he knew better than to hope for Tsuzuki's forgiveness.

"Relax," he assured the kappa before Manju burst a blood vessel. "I only wanted to know what would happen. Lord Enma can rest assured I have no intention of stopping my search."

But perhaps there remained a way he could use the information he found to Enma's disadvantage, when he found it. If he was sufficiently subtle and clever about it. The Count promised he would find a way to communicate with Konoe when word first came down about his "special" assignment. All Konoe could say was, the man had better find a way to do it soon, before they all ran out of time.

* * *

It wasn't the most disturbing attraction Meifu had to offer—Hisoka had seen plenty worse in some of the rooms of the Castle of Candles—but there was something uniquely unsettling about the Lake of Fire. Like someone had mashed together the volcanic lair of a 1960s villain and an indoor water park—complete with creepy landscaping and spiral slides, and a water wheel whose purpose Hisoka could only guess at—to create the creepiest Tokyo Disney ride ever.

"When Watari kept mentioning a lake of fire," Hisoka said, "I thought he was speaking metaphorically."

Natsume clapped him on the back. "Now you know one of Enma-cho's best-kept secrets. Sometimes my colleagues in Billing and I like to come down here and have death-day parties. Crack open a few beers, eat some cake. Kinda reminds us of the sun we never get to see."

"The sun, really?" Staring into the roiling, lava-like ripples, feeling the heat on his skin, Hisoka agreed, "Maybe being on the surface."

"Now you get the idea."

Hands casually in his dress pants pockets, shoulders held a little straighter, it seemed like something crucial was missing from Natsume's person. Namely, his shadow. "K's not joining us for this?"

"I left her back at the office. Demons and cats don't mix well."

"So, this is where Enma used to torture the souls of the sinful," said the voice of a newcomer, who made Natsume do a double-take behind his glasses. "I always wondered what Meifu looked like in its heyday. Before they sold all their fire-and-brimstone rights to Hell."

"Most of the torture pools were paved over a century ago to make room for more office buildings. I never did find out why this one survived. Maybe it just didn't take to demolition as well as the Blood Rapids and Acid Lagoon." Sizing the newcomer up, Natsume's expression was a happy medium between caution of strangers, and approval for the feminine figure this particular stranger possessed. "We like to think of it as 'streamlining the product' here. More focus on delivering the sentence, less on the eternal torment and punishment. But more importantly, Kurosaki, you never mentioned anything to your partner about bringing a mortal to the party."

The light-haired woman crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her long eyes at him; but judging by the energy they were both exuding, Hisoka could see they were hitting it off just fine so far.

"I thought we could use some expert advise with this," Hisoka said. "Someone who's going to make sure we do it right, no mistakes. And I've worked with her before, so you can trust her. Natsume, this is Tsukiori Kira. She's an exorcist."

"Exorcist!" Natsume, however, despite the attitude, did look quite impressed. Tsukiori was a rather severe woman, either wielding or glaring daggers, though seeing her in a blazer and jeans more gender-appropriate than a boys' school uniform did have a way of softening her edges. "Sorry you had to come all this way, Ms. Tsukiori, but we intend to _summon _a demon today, not exorcise one. We are Summons agents, after all."

"Well, don't let me get in the way. But in case anything goes wrong, I'll be standing right here, ready to help. You two probably don't even know how powerful this demon is you're intending to summon, do you?"

When Natsume couldn't think of anything to say to that, Tsukiori smiled. "Relax. While Hisoka and I have been waiting, we set up some booby traps. Just in case the demon breaks out of our summoning circle." The sword in her hand, decorated with a cruciform and golden rays, was, of course, added security.

"We're not expecting that, are we?"

"No. But on the off chance something does go wrong, at least it won't be able to leave the building and run rampant through Juuohcho," Hisoka said.

"Reassuring—for our colleagues, anyway. And I've got the instructions right here." Natsume hefted a meaty tome the Gushoushin had pulled for him from the library stacks. "Shall we get this ball rolling?"

They spread out around the the summoning circle written on the pavement beside the fiery lake, its center writ with a copy of the sigil transferred from the shoggoth. Natsume read aloud the incantation from the book, and the lines glowed in tandem with the rise and fall of his voice, beginning to hum as the magical energy built upon his words. At the incantation's crescendo, Natsume bid the demon appear to them by the name and title they had been able to decipher: stable-hand of the third rank, Margarias.

A sickly green flame erupted from the offering bowl of blood placed at the center of the circle; and when it cleared, a little gnome-like creature was sitting in its place. His faunish knees were pulled up to his chin, which was reptilian in appearance, despite the billy-goat eyes, beard and horns.

"Where am I?" he squeaked, trembling. "What do you want from me?"

"Margarias?" Hisoka asked him. "Are you the demon who let the slime monster loose on Fukuoka?"

"What?" The creature shook so hard Hisoka half expected him to fly apart. "H-how do you know about that? No. No, it wasn't my fault. No one was supposed to know, I was going to make it all better! Please don't tell Master, he'll feed me to the gluttons!"

Natsume laughed. "It was an accident?"

And here Hisoka had been dreading it was another attempt to challenge Tsuzuki to a duel for his titles. It had been years since the Focalor case without another challenge; he didn't think they could press their luck forever. "I think you'd better explain yourself."

"No!" Margarias squeaked, struggling against the holding magic of the circle. "You can't make me talk! Demons who betray their masters' plans get sent to the stables, fed to the dragons."

"We're not interested in the politics of Hell," Kira tried. "And we're certainly not interested in reporting you to your master. You're in Meifu. These two are shinigami. They're just trying to find out who sent the shoggoth they captured in Fukuoka, and what it was doing there in the first place."

The demon started. And, after some consideration, at last his trembling stopped. "Well, that makes sense. No wonder I couldn't find it."

"You've been tracking that shoggoth all this time?" Natsume chuckled.

It wasn't just him, either. The tension of summoning the demon, not knowing what awesome and grotesque power would appear, had all but dissipated from the summoners; and the demon looked like a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders as well as he slowly unfolded himself into a crouching stance.

"I'm a stable-hand of the third order," he started cautiously, "and I was given the very important task of wrangling up more shoggoths for the cavalry."

"Hell uses those things in battle?" Remembering that nightmarish chase through the subway tunnels, Hisoka was incredulous. "I can see how they would instill fear in an enemy, but how do you control them?"

"Shoggoths are easily molded into whatever they're needed for," Margarias said, "if you start 'em young. But breeding in captivity leads to all sorts of problems in the lines: dwarfism, pacificity in the face of enemies, shoggoths who are single-purpose only. Master didn't want to listen, he said, Just keep cloning the existing lines. But _I_ know. The lines get stagnant. They need fresh material—_wild _material. So I took a little trip to one of the last refuges I know of shoggoths in the wild: the sunken city of Yonaguni."

"I knew it!" Natsume said, pounding his fist into his palm. Then, after all eyes had turned on him: "But go on."

"Well, one of them got away," Margarias continued, keeping a wary eye on the bespectacled shinigami. "I had a bunch of wild shoggoths squirmin' and fightin' me I had to deliver to the stables—they're downright ornery before they're broken, and some of 'em never saw a demon in their lives—I had my hands full as it was, no time to go after just one! So I went back afterwards to track it back down. I'd managed to brand it before it escaped, so it wasn't like I lost it; I knew where it was going. Only, the trail went cold in Fukuoka.

"That must be because you got to it before I could! And for that I am deeply in your debt, shinigami." The demon glanced between them. "So, can I have my shoggoth back?"

"Why would we give it back?" said Natsume, but Hisoka didn't feel like toying with the demon. "We can't. It's destroyed. Burned to a crisp in the process of capturing it."

"_What?_" This time Margarias looked less concerned for himself and more for the slime monster. "But it was just scared and confused—it was far from home, it never meant anyone any harm."

"No harm?" Hisoka said. "That thing would have swallowed me whole! While it was running rampant through the city, it caused streets to collapse, homes to fall into sink holes. A train was crushed when a tunnel caved in on it. People _died _because of your precious shoggoth, Margarias!"

The demon was back to trembling now. Only when he started to whine did Hisoka stop to think it might be on account of him.

But the thing before him was a demon of Hell. He didn't see that he owed it any compassion.

"I think the least you owe us for our trouble is some answers," Hisoka told it as he paced around the edge of the summoning circle. "Like the name of your master, and what he needs the shoggoths for." If this had anything to do with Tsuzuki, he was going to find out if he had to rip it out of the demon.

Margarias clapped his lizard hands over his ears. "I don't have to tell. I won't!"

"I thought you were in our debt."

"Until you destroyed my shoggoth, I was! But speaking of my Master to humans—that was never part of any deal!"

"You will tell us, Margarias. Tsukiori here is a rather accomplished exorcist."

"I know who she is." Margarias shot her a wary glare.

"Then you can imagine how many demons just like yourself she's put to the coals in her career. I bet you've heard of Surgatanus, too. I bet everyone with any connection to the cavalry heard what happened to him when he decided to get on Meifu's bad side."

"He was a fool. He thought he could defeat Brigade Commander Tsuzuki and he paid the price."

"But _I _was the one who allowed Tsuzuki to destroy him," Hisoka said, stepping as close to the circle as he dared. It sent a little thrill through him when the demon actually flinched back. He could instill fear in his kind after all. "_I _performed the soul-splitting spell that exorcised Surgatanus from his body."

"_That was you?_"

"It takes a powerful soul to be able to accomplish such a feat," Tsukiori said, staring at Hisoka with more than a hint of awe in her eyes the shinigami had never seen from her in their few dealings. Hisoka thought she would have known about his role in the Surgatanus affair by now, but maybe that detail hadn't made the rounds as well as Tsuzuki's victory. "Any exorcist would see it as a great accomplishment to successfully perform a _reibaku _even once in his career."

"I've learned a lot of new tricks since then," Hisoka told the demon. "Some I haven't yet had a chance to practice in the field. Maybe I should try them out on you."

"Go ahead!" Margarias huffed. "Try your worst. Humans and once-humans have no idea what pains a demon of Hell has to endure on a daily basis."

"He's right, you know." Tsukiori sighed as she turned to the two shinigami, hands on her hips. "I know you two were hoping you wouldn't have to file extra paperwork, but this is the demon equivalent of lawyering up. Sorry, boys, but you can't say you didn't try. It's out of Summons' hands at this point."

Noting the spike in the demon's anxiety, this particular spike he'd displayed at the threat of being ratted out to his master, Hisoka took her hint. "Our superiors aren't going to be happy about this. The whole reason they asked us to find this guy was to avoid an interplanary incident. Now the Judgment Department's going to have to get involved . . ."

Tsukiori shook her head. "Lord Astaroth isn't going to be pleased either, but someone's going to have to answer to Enma for the loss of human life."

"Forget Astaroth," said Natsume. "You don't want to be within a parsec of our boss when we tell him how much it's gonna cost to work out this mess."

"Wait!" Near to hyperventilation, Margarias looked between the three of them, his goatish eyes bulging. "I'll tell you what you want to know—just _please _have mercy! Don't let this get back to Lord Astaroth!"

"Glad we understand each other," said Natsume. "Now was that really so hard?"

But Hisoka knew from experience how effective a motivator the threat of pain was. If he hadn't suffered what he had at Muraki's hands, he wouldn't be much different from this demon, cowering at the thought of torture. The kind of pain that man had given him, the kind of pain still etched into his soul, had a way of turning one defiant against such threats.

And now was no different. If he relented for a moment, the information they wanted might be gone. He had to keep the pressure on. "I'll decide whether or not to turn you over to Judgment when and if you've answered my questions to my satisfaction. What do you need to beef up your cavalry for?"

"I thought you weren't interested in our politics."

"I am when it involves the world of the living and Meifu, and your shoggoth crossed the line. Does this have anything to do with forcing Tsuzuki to join the ranks of Hell?"

"I don't know anything about Commander Tsuzuki," Margarias insisted. "I am only a stable-hand." His gaze kept shifting between the three of them, begging them to believe his story.

Tsukiori could see it, too. "Are you being completely honest with us, Margarias?"

"Yes, yes!" the demon told her. "I was told to increase the shoggoths in the stables. It's not my place to know what for, and I know better than to ask. No one said a thing to me about Tsuzuki.

"You doubt what I say is true," he added in a lower voice at the looks on their faces, "you ask my Master. He'll clear it up, no need to bring our Lord into this. I'm forbidden from speaking his name—but I can show you his sigil! Your exorcist reads Angelish, yes? Give me something to write on."

The two shinigami glanced at Tsukiori, but she indicated with a nod it was safe. Even if the demon tried anything, he was outmatched three-to-one, and by beings more skilled at handling his ilk than he was theirs. A pencil and paper was procured, and after some awkwardness with the stylus, a rough sketch was passed back.

Hisoka recognized the characteristics of a demonic seal from the Surgatanus case—the vaguely cuneiform pitchforks, crosses and curlicues. This one at least was symmetrical: a shape like the box of a stringed instrument, its neck intersected by a double-sided trident. "You can read it," the demon asked Tsukiori, "can't you?"

She looked up from the page to say, "Your master is Duke Zepar."

Margarias vigorously nodded his head.

"You're lying." Hisoka couldn't say exactly how he knew, only that what he could read of the demon empathically told him they weren't getting the whole truth. If he had only inklings of it before, it leapt out at him with certainty at the mention of the devil's name.

"No." Fear of torture quickly overwhelmed whatever else Hisoka could glean from Margarias. "I serve the Duke. I would not lie. I promised I would not lie if you did not tell my Lord. And I haven't. Please."

"Can I talk to you in private?" Tsukiori asked Hisoka.

Natsume said, "I'll make sure he doesn't go anywhere," and Hisoka excused himself from his partner's side with an assenting nod.

When they were out of earshot of the demon, Tsukiori asked him, "It's your empathy, isn't it? You can tell he's not being completely forthcoming too, can't you? He must believe what he's saying, to a strong enough extent to allow him to actually say it, but it's a twisting, a _version _of the truth. Even under oath they find a way of lying without actually lying."

"How can _you _tell?"

Tsukiori shook her head. "It doesn't make sense. I might have guessed Furfur as our demon's master—he is head of stables, after all—but never Zepar. I've had run-ins with Zepar's legions before. No offense to our little friend, but they're much more intelligent, and frighteningly charismatic. You usually find them scoping out bars and nightclubs and political action committees for marks in powerful positions. They almost always use sex to tempt infidelity and corruption. They certainly don't get their feet wet going on fishing expeditions for shoggoths; and if they did, they wouldn't lose one. At least not accidentally."

"Why would a demon lie about the identity of his master?" Hisoka wanted to know.

"There are only two reasons I can think of, and they're not mutually exclusive. Either Zepar really did send him on his mission—which isn't unheard of, especially if his actual master and Zepar are working together—or he wants to shift the blame for his own cock-up onto Zepar."

"Wouldn't that be like breaking rank, or betraying his own master? It sounds like an awfully risky move."

"It is. It could easily come back to haunt him if the wrong party finds out he's been compromised." No doubt why Tsukiori couldn't help but bite her lip as she tried to work it out. "Margarias isn't the smartest demon I've ever met, but he can't be that dumb either. By mentioning Zepar, he must be expecting a payoff of some sort."

"You mean, he expects us to do something." Hisoka wasn't sure he liked where this was going.

"That's highly possible. It could also be a ruse, but I think for the meantime it's best to follow his story, see where it leads us."

"Are you getting the feeling too, that there's something big brewing in Hell?"

"I am," Tsukiori admitted, "and I don't like being left in the dark about it. As Astaroth's hire, I have a duty to stay informed about the political movements of the higher devils; but if Astaroth is at the heart of this, whatever it is . . ." She scowled. "My duties first and foremost are to the Almighty, and the protection of mortal souls. It's an uncomfortable spot to be in, to say the least: serving two masters. But at least I know which is the more important."

"Then, if Margarias's plan is to give up one master in order to save face with the other," Hisoka said, "you two might actually have something in common."

From the look of things, the same thought had occurred to Tsukiori. She looked as though she'd just swallowed a bug. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that."

* * *

In an empty cubicle in the Billing Department, in front of an empty chair, a computer screen flashed as fields filled with coded queries and windows popped into being.

Office e-mails in Meifu only went back to the late-1980s, but even then one could find Tsuzuki's digital footprints. Some might say it was impressive that a man who would be one hundred and two years of age would embrace technology so well. After all, this was before e-mail had become ubiquitous. Even if his prose was a bit . . . raw. It was a new medium then, and typing one's communications must have felt quite a bit different to those used to penning hand-written or even type-written notes. Different, that is, for someone who had opposable thumbs to begin with.

Most of the messages were regarding open cases and addressed to Chief Konoe. But there were a few others more off-the-cuff, more personal. Excited, barely intelligible ramblings to his coworkers about coffee shops and cake shops they had to try when they were in a certain neighborhood, or simple little communiques catching up where oral conversations had left off, and therefore missing context. But there were place names mentioned, enough of them that the Big Boss would be eager to get his hands on these old e-mails, the better to comb through them for possible clues.

And therefore they had to be erased entirely from the system. As if they never even existed.

"Hey, Natsume! You back from the front already, buddy, or just visiting us poor mole people?"

With the voice fast approaching, a tapped key was sufficient to close the window. One more to put the computer into idle mode and activate the screensaver. Next step: Act nonchalant. The coworker was just on the other side of the cubicle wall—

Shimada poked his head in, expecting to see Natsume swiveling around in his chair, with a casual salute or tip of a baseball cap. It had been a while since Shimada had last seen the young man's wisecracking smile and ironic neck ties, and truth be told, he kind of missed Natsume. They were a tight-knit group, Billing, if only because they never really had anyone to talk to but each other, and half of them weren't people-persons to begin with.

But his expression fell when all he saw was an empty chair and screensaver, and beside it, a bleary-eyed K poking her head up from a nap to see what all the fuss was about.

"Oh, K, it's just you," Shimada said, shifting into the higher register he always used when speaking to her, probably without realizing it. With no human around to assure him he wasn't trespassing, he stepped into the cubicle just long enough to stroke her head a few times. K's purr seemed to indicate she didn't mind too much. "Thought I heard your human in here typing away, but I guess I must have been imagining things, huh?"

K just blinked up at him.

"Yeah, I'll let you get back to your nap, you good girl. Give Natsume my best next time you see him."

Shimada walked away, and K listened to his footsteps until they ended back at his own cubicle down the hall. Now that she had assumed the position, a catnap actually didn't sound too bad. She had accomplished what she set out to do. In a few hours, when she was well rested, she could go track down her human and see what he had been up to in the meantime. Maybe she could convince him to get her one of those anchovy snacks from the drawer she couldn't open herself as well.

* * *

When the notes had faded beneath his fingers, Hijiri could still hear the melody drifting toward him from the kitchenette. Yamada Tsutomu, his roommate, bandmate, and—it was time he just admitted it—live-in boyfriend, whistled the sonata as he stood over the stove, albeit the harpsichord part that at times echoed and at others harmonized with Hijiri's violin. If Hijiri closed his eyes, he could picture Tsutomu's fingers flying over the keys, the curve of his neck as he tipped his ear to the keyboard, lingering on a trill.

Hijiri smiled, and turned to look over the couch. "Smells delicious. You never did say what you were making."

"You mean you can't tell just by the aroma?" Tsutomu leaned over to take a whiff himself, fanning the steam coming off one of the sauce pans.

"Nothing too ambitious, I hope," Hijiri chuckled. Somehow he had ended up with someone challenged in the kitchen. He hadn't planned it that way, but it did remind him of a certain someone.

"It's just spaghetti bolognese," Tsutomu said, feigning hurt. "Hard to mess that up."

Hijiri kept his mouth shut at that and smiled to himself. It was nights like this he wondered what Tsuzuki was doing, whether anything major had changed in his life (if "life" was indeed the right word to describe a shinigami's existence) since Hijiri had last seen him. After all, he owed Tsuzuki his current happiness, in a way. If not for his intervention, Hijiri would probably never have survived to see his seventeenth birthday.

But there were other ways he owed Tsuzuki, too, paths Hijiri may never have had the guts to take in his life, realizations he had come to that he may never have otherwise if he had not met Tsuzuki, never felt touched the way those few weeks with Tsuzuki had touched him. He might still be just as happy, but it was difficult to see how, when there was nothing in Hijiri's life now he could imagine wanting to change.

A fork wound with spaghetti and meat sauce was lowered into his peripheral vision, and Hijiri automatically jumped back. "Careful! You'll drip on the sofa."

Tsutomu laughed. "Not if you don't hurry up and eat it, worry wart. Just give it a try. I guarantee, you won't be disappointed."

Hijiri put his hand over Tsutomu's, steadying the fork, and carefully pulled noodles and sauce into his mouth. If he had to be honest, he half expected hot sauce to light up his tongue at any moment, or a strange combination of spices to unbalance the flavor.

To his pleasant surprise, it was delicious. Really delicious. Though all Hijiri could convey of that was an appreciative "Mmmm!"

"See?" Tsutomu ruffled his hair before turning back to the kitchen. "And here you doubted my abilities. Come and get it."

While his boyfriend set the tiny dining table, Hijiri stood to stretch his weary limbs. Not that the old familiar ache he felt in his neck and wrists, the slight tingling in his fingers after practice, was a feeling he hated. Quite the opposite. They were the signs of a good musical workout. "I guess all those lazy Sunday mornings sitting around watching cooking shows finally paid off, huh?" He set his violin on its stand. Maybe there would be time to run through the new piece after dinner, especially if Tsutomu joined in with him on the Yamaha.

"I didn't hear you complaining."

If anything, Hijiri treasured that time. There were all sorts of ways to spend a day off on the couch, though helping Tsutomu take notes during a cooking program was not one of the ways that particularly made Hijiri blush.

Just as he was pulling out his chair, the doorbell rang. "Always when you're eating, right?" Hijiri sighed.

"You didn't order out just in case, did you, ye of little faith?" Tsutomu joked. But he handed the bottle of wine he was in the process of opening to Hijiri, and went the few more steps to the door himself.

As he gave the corkscrew a tug, Hijiri called after him in jest, loud enough for the solicitors to hear: "Just tell them we don't want any and send them on their way." Tsutomu cooking him a romantic dinner that was actually quite edible? Hijiri didn't intend to let salesmen ruin his night.

* * *

Hisoka called the number written on the card, but after several rings, hung up when he heard Hijiri's voicemail recording begin.

"No answer?" Natsume said. Hisoka's knitted brows told him enough. "It's probably nothing, you know. He could be seeing a movie, or his battery died. I know my phone has a tendency to ring right when I get to the cash register."

"I know," Hisoka said. "And you're probably right." There were any number of reasons for Hijiri not to answer, all of them perfectly natural and logical.

But none of them made the niggling sense of unease go away. Margarias's words continued to haunt him. If there was some new plot brewing in Hell, though he had no idea what it could be—if there was even the slightest possibility that it had any connection to Tsuzuki, he had to know the survivors of their old cases with demons were safe, and Hijiri was at the top of that list. Hisoka had to warn him, and help him take the proper precautions to protect himself from the likes of Surgatanus. At least until he and Natsume had more information on this Zepar character, found out what he was planning.

He tried again, and this time left a short message when he reached voicemail. Even that didn't feel like enough, so he sent a quick e-mail to the number as well, telling Hijiri to call him as soon as he got it.

"We should head over to his residence, just to be safe," Tsukiori suggested, having overheard.

"You really think this is something to worry over?" Natsume asked her.

But Hisoka was relieved to have the exorcist on his side. "Even if he's not at home, we should at least set up some demon traps around the perimeter, make sure none can get in until we can speak with him."

"Great idea, but with one problem: I don't know where he lives." The business card said nothing of a home address. Just the address for the school Hijiri attended, and the music department his club belonged to. It was a place to start, but at this time of the evening, a long shot that Hijiri would be there.

A thought occurred to Hisoka, and he called the Gushoushin. "Library," the younger brother said when he picked up. "What can I help you with?"

"Can you find a mortal's address for me, Gushoushin? It's an emergency."

"Hey, Hisoka!" The bird's voice brightened at the recognition. They didn't see much of each other these days. Todoroki's investigation had made all divisions put some distance between themselves and their neighbors—and particularly, distance between themselves and Summons. Hisoka didn't blame the brothers for covering their necks; and whatever else might happen between departments, they still had a soft spot for Hisoka. "I'll see what I can do," said Gushoushin the Younger, "but if the person you're looking for isn't slated to show up in the kiseki for some time, you might be out of luck." The clacking of keys in the background. "You have a name?"

"This one should be in there for a different reason," Hisoka told him. He _hoped _for a different reason. "I need to find Minase Hijiri's current home address."

"_Eh?_" Gushoushin screeched into the phone. "What happened to Hijiri? Is he in trouble?"

"That's what we're trying to find out. Which is why I'm hoping Juuohcho is still keeping up-to-date on his information. E-mail my phone if you find anything."

"You see," Natsume remarked to fill the silence while they waited, "this is why I truly believe cell phones are going to replace personal computers in the future."

Tsukiori looked at him sideways. "You've gotta be kidding me."

"No joke. Everyone has one, they're way more convenient to lug around." Natsume ticked off his points on his fingers. "You'd just pull it out of your pocket to see if you've got new mail, check your location on GPS, see what your stocks are doing, pay your bills. And you'd be amazed what they're doing with microprocessors these days. They're getting close to letting you listen to music on them. It's not long till you could be watching a movie or playing a game while in line for coffee."

"That would be something," said the exorcist, no doubt thinking how her job might be made a little easier, "but I'll believe it when I see it."

Gushoushin's return left whatever retort had been on the tip of Natsume's tongue unspoken. "Okay, I've got one. Not sure if it's current, but it's worth a shot. I sent it to your phone."

"Thanks, Gushoushin," Hisoka told him. "You're a lifesaver, really."

"Just let me know Hijiri's okay when you find him, hm?"

* * *

Just his luck: The tall young man who answered the door happened to be a handsome one.

"Nice face," Zepar grinned. "I think I'll take it."

He grabbed Tsutomu by the shirt, pushing him back into the apartment; and Tsutomu was too stunned to do anything but stumble back the way he was led as his attacker's face shifted before his eyes into his own. Not exactly his reflection, however, but some malignant facsimile, like a manifestation of all the most evil and sadistic thoughts buried deep down in his soul, complete with a reddish tint.

Hijiri cried out, knocking over the chair as he jumped to this feet. It was like a home invasion nightmare, only worse: Normally the invaders didn't change themselves into your boyfriend's evil twin right before your eyes.

But it was the man who entered behind him that froze him to the spot. He must have been around Tsuzuki's age, though with bone-white hair, and he carried himself like a man of eighty. Only with the gravity of eight hundred—a wake of awesome and ancient power that could only be felt. Like the rock of a boat beneath one's feet, or the beating of waves against a stone wall.

Satisfied the man in Zepar's grip was not his target, he turned his full attention on Hijiri, and stepped toward him. "Otonashi Tetsuya?"

Hijiri grabbed the closest weapon at hand. Unfortunately, the corkscrew wasn't a very long implement, or sharp. "He-he's dead," he told the devil, backing away. "And so is Surgatanus. I know what this is about, and I'm telling you the pact is done. Gone. Look. I received Otonashi's cornea, but that's it—that's the only connection I have to him. Whatever debt he owed you people, I have nothing to do with it."

Focalor shrugged. "You may be right about that, but that isn't what I came all this way for. Nor will I go back empty handed. Your vessel will serve my purposes just fine, with or without my predecessor's pact."

"Hijiri, what—" Tsutomu started, but a flash of blinding pain cut him off, sent him doubling with a howl.

"Don't hurt him!" Hijiri hollered, pleaded with his captors, though for the life of him he hadn't seen that Zepar had done anything to physically harm Tsutomu. The red devil's grip was tight, but not excruciatingly so. Hijiri turned to the white-haired man, gasping, "Please, just let him go. He's innocent in all this. You want me, fine, but don't hurt him."

Amazing how quickly the self-sacrificing instinct rose up within him, despite his terror at the mere thought of what these devils might have in store for him. Somehow even that was nothing compared to seeing Tsutomu tormented like this, and knowing it was on account of him.

Zepar grinned up at his partner. "You see what I mean?" he asked Focalor. "Isn't his suffering delicious?"

He grabbed a fistful of Tsutomu's hair and gave it a yank, but it seemed a far greater pain was responsible for Tsutomu's cries when he fell to his knees.

But it was Hijiri the devil was pointing his chin at. Dread sank like a cold stone inside him. Just the thought that these two might tear Tsutomu apart in front of him, and all to watch him suffer, felt like dying already. Like his heart was being wrenched still beating from his chest. And the red devil knew it. Nothing he said would matter. The more willingly he went along with their demands, the more the violent one would torture Tsutomu.

"And to know that you are the cause of his suffering?" Focalor's voice was close at his ear, even if the white-haired man still stood at arm's length. It rustled through his cochlea, lapped at his mind like a wave on the sand. Threatening to pull him out to deeper, darker waters. "How does that feel, seeing the one you care for in such agony? My colleague here believes that is the worst torture a man can endure."

Hijiri stifled a sob. But it was hopeless. If he said it was, Tsutomu was as good as dead. And if he lied, who knows what the other one would do to prove his point.

"It hurts. Does it not? It almost makes one want to give it all up. But I can make your hurting stop. I know a place where there is no pain, and you don't even have to leave your own mind."

The first icy touch of Focalor's fingers against the side of his face startled Hijiri back to his own situation. There was nowhere else to go; his back was against the wall. Now that the devil was so close, he could smell the brine on his dry skin, the rotting of sea creatures washed ashore—could glimpse the dark pools of his heavy eyes beneath the white veil of fringe, deep as those trenches where sunlight never reached. Each syllable resonated in his mind until his voice seemed to surround Hijiri like pitch-black waters, and he with no way of knowing which way was up.

"Look at me, Minase Hijiri. They say the eye is the window to the soul, but in reality, it is much more like a doorway. Take a second to appreciate your loneliness one last time, and open it to me. Open yourself to company. I don't intend to draw out your pain. A nice, seamless transition would be a pleasant change of pace."

From across the room, Zepar scoffed. It was pure evil if ever Hijiri recognized it: to see Tsutomu's rakish features twisted in malicious rapture, while the real Tsutomu writhed in pain beneath it.

"Of course," Focalor said, "I cannot control what my colleague ultimately decides to do with your lover."

Those cold, dry fingers violently pried Hijiri's eyelids open, and he could only will his breathing to slow and wait for it to happen—for that first unmistakable tendril of possession to shoot along his neurons, throw him to the peripheries of his own brain.

There was a sudden change of air pressure, a whoosh like wings in the air, and then the apartment's occupants were increased by three.

The devils stopped and turned to stare, stuck for one brief moment in a tableau. An interruption was not something either of them had expected, least of all from Kurosaki and that meddling exorcist, that thorn in Focalor's side, Tsukiori Kira. The third was not someone he recognized, which was just as well. The cat was out of the bag, his survival of Saint Michel was known. Focalor only regretted that he could not have revealed himself _after _attaining his new vessel.

It might have been only half a second that the apartment's occupants all remained in a stunned stand-still; but seeing Hisoka's face again, now at the very moment of need, was all Hijiri needed to feel hope rushing back. Remembering the corkscrew, he aimed for the face, and was rewarded when the white devil howled and grabbed at his torn cheek.

The shinigami wasted no time. They flew into action, Hisoka reaching into his jacket for fuda, his partner for what looked like cherry bombs. The woman was a bit better prepared, if only because she had thought to bring a sword. And how it flashed as it arced through the air at Tsutomu's attacker. Just don't hit the real Tsutomu, Hijiri prayed as he watched.

His own victory didn't last more than a moment, though: A hard blow sent him stumbling into the kitchenette, where the side of his head connected solidly with the handle on a cabinet.

Hisoka was watching, however, and with the white-haired devil standing between him and the person he had come to protect, Hijiri's spill was actually the break he needed to attack. A fuda scrawled with Angelish charms stuck to the back grabbed the devil's attention. He roared in pain and outrage both, and spun to face his attacker. Hisoka, expecting it, was ready, and threw up a barrier.

What he was not prepared for was the face that stared back at him. Even transformed by the devil's occupation and rage—and the cut Hijiri had opened in his cheek—Hisoka recognized that face from the past. He couldn't place it immediately, only that it felt deeply wrong to him, impossible even. As if that face belonged to someone who was supposed to be dead.

His second of hesitation was all the devil needed. This was more than Focalor had bargained for. Not only were he and Zepar outnumbered, and Focalor still trapped in this weak and now injured vessel. They might have stood a chance against any other shinigami; but whatever was in those cherry bombs was making it hard to breathe, and he had no wish to battle both Kurosaki and that exorcist woman, and risk a repeat of that night in the school chapel. In fact, he would have rather they still believe he was extinct.

With all the power he could muster, Focalor opened a portal to Hell, large enough for one. Zepar was on his own; this whole mess had been his idea to begin with. Whether he survived it or not, Focalor didn't give two shits.

The white-haired devil gone, Hisoka made a beeline for Hijiri. There was nothing he could do about it anyway, and plenty of time to try and place that familiar face later. Making sure Hijiri wasn't grievously injured or possessed was Hisoka's main concern now—the young man's shirt front was soaked and red, and the blow to the head couldn't have done him any good either—as Tsukiori and his partner tried to contain the other devil.

Zepar's tactic of using the barely conscious Yamada Tsutomu as a human shield served him well enough at first—until a clever teleportation move on Natsume's part spirited the Yamada boy right out of his arms, and forced him to concentrate on Tsukiori. The red devil managed to manifest a short sword just before her blessed blade bore down on him, and deflect her blow.

Tsukiori was strong—Zepar had to admire that—but she was still just a mortal, and a woman. Locking her blade against his, he was able to rush in close, and deal her a hard shove that sent her falling back into the TV in the corner with a yelp.

He allowed himself a small grin at that, and turned to deal with Natsume. The Yamada boy was proving an unwieldy burden, but not so much Natsume couldn't toss one of his little bombs at Zepar's feet. It popped, and the biting sting of purifying salt floated into his eyes and up his nostrils—perfectly innocuous for humans, but a thousand times worse than pepper spray to the infernal.

Still not enough to bring one of them to their knees, though. Zepar laughed through a cough. "_That's _what you chose to bring to a fight with the devil, boy? You planning to exorcise me or give me a spa treatment?"

With Tsukiori still struggling to her feet in the corner, Zepar expected another several seconds to recover from the salt before facing her again. He certainly didn't expect to feel her thrown blade slide effortlessly through his back and lodge between his ribs. Worse than the sting of penetration, the metal burned like angel fire through his flesh. A chant in Latin uttered between ragged breaths activated the blade, and the rays of light carved into the hilt spun out like shimmering spider silk to bind Zepar's arms to his torso. He raged in disbelief as they cut in, twisted against them, but there was nothing he could do to break them, let alone teleport himself back to the safety of Hell. This was strong magic, an unholy union between the lost metallurgy of Heaven and his own master's tricks.

At least Zepar had been right about one thing: The sting of betrayal hurt just as bad as any physical wound. Focalor would pay dearly for abandoning him in his need. And the exorcist woman would rue this insult, just as soon as Zepar found some way to free himself of her trap.

A string of curses that would curdle milk spilled out through his teeth, but Tsukiori remained quite unaffected as she laid hands on her sword's grip again, twisting it in just a little bit deeper. "Save some of that for later, Zepar," she said in his ear. "You'll have plenty of time to stew in Meifu."

"Oh, goodie," he growled, managing a pained grin. "I always wanted to see how the sausage was made."

Despite Tsutomu being a full head taller, Natsume managed to heft the young man over his shoulder. Hisoka steadied Hijiri—splashed with wine and mind swimming from the blow to the head, but otherwise unharmed—as he got to his feet. Looking around at the damage to his apartment, the overturned chairs and ruined dinner and cracked TV, the violin snapped in half and caved in that broke his heart almost as much as Tsutomu's unconscious form, Hijiri was only too happy to leave.


	7. They're all victims of circumstance

Yamada was resting when Hisoka found Hijiri, the latter sitting in a plastic chair facing the bed in the infirmary. The young violinist's temple sported a spreading bruise, and no doubt at least a mild concussion beneath it, but at least the wound didn't appear too swollen. "How are you holding up?" Hisoka asked him.

Hijiri looked up only long enough to say, "I'll recover."

It was Yamada he was unsure about. And though the young man had no cuts or broken bones, and his breathing was steady and deep, Hisoka didn't need empathy to know it was tearing Hijiri up inside to see his friend like this. He was no stranger to the worry and guilt and anger that must be Hijiri's total reality, the what-ifs running through his mind without end. The knowledge that it was because of him, by guilt of association with Hijiri and a past he had never asked for, that Yamada had been put through this torment.

_Anyone who sees a shinigami is doomed to die. _How many times had Hisoka heard a living soul say that in his presence? And how many times did it have to prove true? How many had to suffer the consequences of his association?

As if reading his thoughts—rather than the other way around for once—Hijiri suggested with a nod of his head that they speak outside.

He asked Hisoka when the door was softly closed behind them, "So, are you going to tell me what happened to Tsuzuki?"

"What makes you think something happened?"

"I figured he would have come to see me by now if he was around."

Hisoka swallowed a retort. Of course, given the closeness that had arisen between Hijiri and Tsuzuki after the Surgatanus affair—a closeness that Hisoka would be lying if he said he didn't envy—if Tsuzuki knew Hijiri was here in Meifu, no one would be able to keep him away.

At least, that was what Hisoka would have said before their last encounter with Muraki. Now he wasn't so sure.

"He hasn't . . . moved on. Has he?" Hijiri's voice was small, as though fearing the subject might be taboo in the land of the dead.

"No, nothing like that. He still exists—at least, for all we know he does. Tsuzuki, um . . . he sort of took off." There was no reason to hide the truth from Hijiri, even if Hisoka didn't have to be forthcoming with every last detail. "After our last case, last fall. No one really knows where he is, and that's kind of a problem around here. I wish I had more to tell you, but that's about all I know."

Hijiri lowered his eyes. "I'm sorry to hear it. I know this might sound cold, but . . ." A ragged sigh. "Maybe it's for the best right now, that he's not around. I wouldn't want him to see Tsutomu. I mean, like this. The guilt—"

He couldn't help looking back toward the door, and Hisoka felt no offense. He knew he was part of the guilty party. Nor did either of them need to finish the thought aloud to understand each other perfectly. "How is Yamada?"

As if Hijiri's pale complexion, and the dead look in his eyes, wasn't answer enough. "Tsutomu doesn't want me to touch him. He says it's nothing personal, that he knows it wasn't my fault, but when he looks at me, the—_revulsion _that's in his eyes. . . ."

_He blames you for it nonetheless. Just like I blamed Tsuzuki, because he wasn't there when _I _needed him. Whether he deserved it or not._

Hijiri shook his head, and Hisoka wished for a moment he was the kind of person who always had the right words at times like this, the kind of person who instinctively reached out and put his arms around others' shoulders when they were suffering. But he wasn't, and the only result of such an action would be to feel Hijiri's ache in himself, as if it were his own. Wasn't one's own guilt enough for one soul to bear?

"I don't even know what happened to him," Hijiri went on when Hisoka would not oblige him with false reassurances and deny the truth of his feelings. "Watari says physically he's healthy, there was no harm done. But I know the devil did something to his mind or soul. He wounded him inside, in ways probably far worse than I can even imagine."

"He'll get past this," Hisoka assured him. "You just have to give him time, and lots of patience. I don't know how much. You just have to trust him to open up about it when he feels the time is right. I mean, look what happened to each of us, and we got through it eventually. You might even say we're stronger for what we survived."

"Maybe that's true. But will he ever forgive me? After all, _I'm _the one who dragged him into this mess. He got hurt because of me. If I had never met him, if I hadn't asked him to move in with me, he would never have had to suffer like this."

"Don't ever think for a moment that you somehow asked for this to happen."

Familiar words, and they had as much impact on Hijiri as they had when Hisoka had been the object of them. "But it _is _my fault! The devils came after _me._ Even Tsutomu was just another means of getting to me in their eyes. I was so sure they were going to kill him, Hisoka."

He shook his head to banish the thought. And though he was taller, his face leaner, he seemed to Hisoka no older than the sixteen-year-old boy who had woken up in the same bed Yamada was in now, crying tears of relief to find he was still alive. Crying because he didn't know how much longer he would be. That little victory had been no consolation against an uncertain future, nor was it now. "I thought the contract was gone, you people assured me it was, but somehow they still sniffed me out. They still found me."

"Did you have Watari check you out?"

"Yes. And he said even with the contract erased, a shadow of it remains etched in my eye, like when you write too hard on a pad of paper and you can still read what you wrote several sheets down."

Another classic Watari Yutaka analogy, Hisoka thought.

Hijiri shook his head. "They're never going to leave me alone, are they? I'm always going to have to look over my shoulder wherever I go, for the rest of my life. And anyone connected to me will always be in danger. I can't put Tsutomu through that again—or anyone else, for that matter. I wasn't even sure if I wanted to have kids, but they're certainly out of the question now. I'll never be free of Otonashi's pact, of Surgatanus. I don't know what to do, short of cutting out my own eye."

"Don't do that." Hisoka had to say it, before the other actually gave serious thought to the idea. "There are lots of things you can do to protect yourself, things you aren't going to regret later on. We can teach you."

Still Hijiri looked less than convinced. Nor could Hisoka blame him for being skeptical.

"Tsukiori's offered to demon-proof your apartment when you're ready to go back. She can show you what to do so you don't have to be afraid all the time. In the meantime, you should both stay here in Juuohcho until we can guarantee your safety."

"Thanks, Hisoka. I know it's not the norm to bring mortals into Meifu like this, let alone twice in one lifetime, but I'm grateful." And finally the tension in Hijiri's shoulders lifted, albeit only a bit, and the knot that had been twisting in his gut began to relax. "Can I just ask one favor in return?"

"What's that?"

"If that devil you captured doesn't give you what you want, beat it out of him," Hijiri said through his teeth. "Beat the shit out of him."

* * *

Perhaps Hisoka hadn't been entirely honest with Hijiri where Tsuzuki was concerned, but his old lookalike had enough on his plate without adding Tsuzuki's well being to his worries. If Hijiri knew what kind of punishment Tsuzuki was really facing for his absence, there was no telling how it would affect him in his fragile state. Or what reckless thing he might try to do to help. There were limits to what Hisoka could protect him from, and he doubted Enma's own security force was one of them.

As for his favor to Hijiri, Hisoka would only be too happy to comply. Zepar only need give him a reason.

Tsukiori and Natsume were on watch, camped out in the cramped observation room when Hisoka joined them, and his arrival relieved his partner.

"You're sure about this?" Tsukiori asked him again before she and Hisoka left for the holding chamber. "You're sure you're ready to face him?"

"Another minute thinking about it isn't going to do Tsuzuki any good."

But the exorcist wasn't content with such an answer. She grabbed his arm, and forced him to meet her eyes. "Hey, don't take this lightly, Kurosaki. I know you've faced devils before, and more powerful in terms of raw physical strength than this one, but Zepar's a different breed. He'll try everything to get under your skin—"

"And I'll see through his lies the same way I did Margarias's." At Tsukiori's persistent concern, however, he amended in a more somber tone: "I'll be careful. But I can't wait forever for him to talk if he decides to play stubborn."

"Torture isn't going to work on this one," Tsukiori warned him. "Neither is rushing in there beating your chest. Devils are masters of manipulation, and few more so than Zepar. The best thing you can do for yourself is stay vigilant and keep a level head, and between the two of us, we may just be able to worm something useful out of him."

Zepar wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. That was one thing, at least, they were sure of. They had exchanged the shore of the lake of fire for a secure interrogation room Natsume managed to procure for them through his Billing access. (Why that would raise fewer eyebrows than going through Summons, Hisoka was sure there was a story about.) And when Juuohcho considered a place secure, that meant doors and locks thick and heavy enough to contain a minor nuclear meltdown. Which was apparently not an unheard of occurrence. There were stranger beasts in the various realms of being than known science had a ready answer for.

Physical measures were well and good for a physical danger, but a duke of Hell required a little something extra. A glowing hexagram held Zepar spread-eagled and fast a few feet above the ground. That was generated by the blessed blade still impaling his chest. The hilt had been removed and was in Tsukiori's possession for safe-keeping; without it to "unlock" and retract the ornamental rays-turned-barbs, the blade wasn't going anywhere without taking a hefty chunk of flesh along with it.

Below Zepar's feet turned wheel within wheel of containment spells, writ in Angelish and the various ancient magic scripts whose commands the diabolical were by their nature unable to refuse, and anchored with the appropriately resonating minerals which held Zepar to their plane of existence by his very spiritual essence, like an insect mounted on a board. Physically, he was powerless, and his movements severely restricted: He could struggle, but it wouldn't do much besides tax his energy. There was certainly no way he could vanish back to his own realm so long as that circle remained intact, and the blessed sword remained lodged in his being.

His shape-shifting abilities, on the other hand, appeared largely unaffected. He had been wearing Yamada's face when they first caught him; but in transport, and since being disconnected from his source of inspiration, it had lost some of its more accurate nuances.

When he saw Hisoka, however, he lit back up as a plethora of new possibilities swept into the chamber with him. Zepar took the obvious choice. Focalor may have failed in his plan to occupy Minase Hijiri's body, but Zepar succeeded in another way, without the pesky need for possession.

"Kurosaki Hisoka," he said with the voice and grin of a sixteen-year-old Minase, plucked fresh from memory. "How good to finally meet the legend in the flesh. Well, so to speak."

Hisoka huffed. "You've heard of me?"

"All Hell knows of you, through your connection to Brigade Commander Tsuzuki. You're almost as hated and feared as that bitch."

At his nod in her direction, Tsukiori clenched her jaw. "Comfortable, Zepar?" she gritted through her teeth. "Because I could shove that knife in a little deeper if that would please you. Maybe twist it around in there. I hear you're quite comfortable being on the receiving end."

"Too bad it doesn't force you to appear in your true form," Hisoka said. "Not very courteous of you to start our relationship on a deception."

Zepar scoffed at them both. "Believe me. You wouldn't want to see me naked." And of course he had no intention of changing his shape now. Not when he could sense how much it disturbed the young shinigami to see his past reflected back at him.

"I just finished explaining to your partner and the lovely Kira, here," he practically spat her name, "before you deigned to join us, Kurosaki, why it would be in Enma-cho's best interest to release me at once. We serve the same master, she and I, and He will be very displeased when He hears what you've done to His servant. Holding a duke of Hell hostage when I've _technically_ done nothing illegal—"

"You attacked a mortal with no connection to Hell and no mention in the kiseki," Hisoka reminded him, "a mortal who had not summoned you or broken a deal, for no other reason than spiritual terrorism."

"Ah, but I didn't _kill _or _maim _or _possess _the lad, did I?"

It was all Hisoka could do to remember Tsukiori's plead for patience. He itched to blast the grin right off the devil's face so badly.

"Let's not forget why you targeted Minase in the first place," Tsukiori said. "Astaroth forbade his servants to challenge Tsuzuki for his seat of power. I doubt your actions would be easy to overlook in light of their connection."

"Ah, but that's where you're mistaken," said Zepar. "For one, I'm not after Tsuzuki's position. And second, I was charged by Lord Astaroth Himself with the very task of locating the bastard commander."

"And Hijiri was what? Your bait?" Hisoka said. When he allowed himself to think what might have happened if they hadn't gone to Hijiri's apartment when they did, and on a hunch of all things. . . .

Zepar shrugged, as much as the hexagram allowed him. "I wasn't told there were any restrictions on how I could go about accomplishing my mission, so long as I got it done. But I suppose it was a long-shot in the end. He never showed, and the rest of the story you know. When I saw it was the illustrious Tsukiori Kira and Tsuzuki's wunderkind partner who had come to collect me, I decided, why not make the most of it? I always wanted to see Meifu, the country where so many of our newest citizens hail from. But I didn't think you two would actually be foolish enough to bring me back here."

Tsukiori snorted. "You don't actually expect us to believe you _allowed _yourself to be caught, do you? If I had a yen for every time some low-life screw-up of a demon tried to feed me that line. . . ."

Hisoka had to admit, though, there was a certain logic to it.

Or at least, so a little voice inside seemed to urge him with every word that fell from Zepar's lips. "Of course. You don't actually think such a one of my rank and reputation would be so easy for a couple of humans to defeat, do you? I _let_ you win. You know that's the only reason I'm here and the both of you still standing. Just like I'm letting you have this little self-congratulatory moment, believing you were so smart and strong to have captured me. Believing your little traps and magic circles can hold me. Meanwhile, all Enma's secrets are lying in wait somewhere outside these doors you think are so secure, and you've brought me right to them, all on your own accord."

Zepar chuckled. "I should thank you two, really. You've made my job easier than I could have possibly imagined. And as a bonus, I get to chat with two living legends, see what makes them tick. —Well, living in Kira's case, I guess."

That was it: that little voice. He was trying so hard to convince Hisoka of his lies, they actually became dreadfully apparent. "You're right. He is trying to manipulate us," he said to Tsukiori.

Who sneered, "Yeah, you figured that out that too?"

"It's more than that. More than just telepathy. It's the way he's doing it. Putting emphasis on security so we'll start looking for flaws in his containment ourselves—flaws observation alone would never reveal. The more we think about them, the easier he can read our thoughts. He's trying to get us to do his work for him, all without us realizing we're helping him. Because so far, he has no idea how he's going to get out of this one and it's all he can do not to panic.

"And I very much doubt any of his friends will be coming to his rescue." Hisoka's stare challenged the devil to say he was wrong. "They're not the type to stick their necks out for a colleague who's gone rogue, if they even know where he is. Especially if that colleague is as puffed-up and cocky as this one. I'm sure he has enemies back home who would be celebrating if they knew about this."

No one enjoyed being spoken of like they were a piece of furniture in the room, least of all a devil. Nor was it a pleasant experience to have the thoughts one very much wanted to keep to himself snatched up like a rabbit from its burrow. The grin on Zepar's lips slowly turned stale and bitter.

Then the pieces clicked, and another grin appeared to replace it, this one far from pleased, but altogether more wicked. "Oh, I see. An empath. I could have fun with this one."

"It's a clever trick," Hisoka allowed him. "Implanting false certainty in your words so they'll go down easier, even if your subtlety leaves something to be desired. Tsukiori warned me your legions were charismatic. I guess now I know where they get it."

"Their powers of influence pale in comparison to mine. Really, Kira, don't you think I might have a word alone with the boy?" The devil was nearly breathless at the thought. "I'd love to show him what I can _really_ do. Promise I won't take long."

"How stupid do you take me for?" She crossed her arms over her chest. "It's bad enough you're being this talky. Normally I have to threaten or bribe or beat an answer out of your lot."

"Disappointed, Kira? Or does my being forthcoming make you uneasy? I have nothing to hide." Hisoka couldn't miss the deeper meaning when Zepar turned to him as he said so.

So Hisoka seized the opportunity. "Then you wouldn't mind giving up the identity of the devil who was with you in the apartment."

In lieu of a reply, Zepar nodded to Tsukiori. "She knows."

"It was Focalor," Tsukiori sighed, uncrossing her arms. "I thought for sure Tsuzuki had destroyed him in the fire at Saint Michel, but apparently I was wrong."

Hisoka started. "Then the reason he looked so familiar—"

"Was because he possessed Professor Mitani's body before he was destroyed in Okazaki's corpse." They had arrived somewhat later on the scene, he and Tsukiori; but Hisoka had heard the account later from Tsuzuki, of how Mitani, the institute's Christian history teacher and Okazaki's lover, had wandered away from Tsuzuki's side. Enthralled by the devil's appearance and still in mourning for the boy, he had approached and was in Focalor's grasp before anyone could stop him. A kiss was all it took to seal his fate—a kiss that had allowed Focalor to transfer some ungodly essence into Mitani's body. And, they had all assumed, end his life in the process.

Hisoka didn't need it spelled out any further than that to understand how such a thing was possible, that a demon could be in two places at once. He'd watched Surgatanus obliterated in one body, while a seed of himself implanted in Tsuzuki was just beginning to grow. Except unlike Tsuzuki's case, they had all assumed Mitani was dead. The last they had seen of him was a corpse, drowned in the middle of a burning chapel. At the time, there had seemed no need to search for a body once that chapel was reduced to ash and rubble.

Apparently Tsukiori was thinking the same thing. "He must have touched Mitani," she said to Hisoka, "entered his bloodstream in some way before we got there. There must be something we missed; otherwise, I would never have let him regain his strength inside a new host. Not after what he did. Focalor went too far."

"If Mitani-sensei's soul is still trapped in there with him," Hisoka thought, "our department should have been alerted—"

"Don't worry yourselves," Zepar butted in, chuckling. "Focalor's riding a corpse. Nothing to get Enma's knickers in a twist over—or hakama, or whatever he wears. But that also makes him weak. And the lot of you came between him and a stronger vessel. If I were Focalor, I'd be pretty pissed. I'd be plotting how I could make you pay right about now."

"That was the plan, then? He was going to get his revenge on Tsuzuki by possessing someone he cared about?"

It was too easy. A good plan, one that Hisoka could see occurring to a devil, but Zepar was far too forthcoming about it. Besides being bound, he had endured no torture to make him talk. Nothing worse than Tsukiori's blade in his gut, that is, and even that sting must have dulled to a steady discomfort by now.

The devil smiled. "Wouldn't you feel the same if someone destroyed _your_ body?"

Was he speaking hypothetically, or scrounging around in Hisoka's memories? Hisoka shut them down, raised his mental barriers. The last thing he needed was Zepar digging up his past with Muraki to use against him.

"Of course, Focalor doesn't need a _living _body with a _soul _in it to keep ticking," Zepar said. "Though it does help. Keeps everything regular, so to speak. You can only take a corpse so far before you wear it out to the point of uselessness. By then, trust me, you want a back-up body in place. Sort of the same reason we devils don't like to make a habit of being in two people at once. Stretches one a bit thin, as I'm sure you can imagine. But it works in a pinch, if you're sufficiently desperate."

"Why would you tell us this? Couldn't we use stuff like this against you?" Or was there some deeper motive to Zepar's line of discussion that Hisoka wasn't quite seeing, some trap he was afraid he would not catch on to until he was caught in it?

"It isn't a trap," Zepar told him pointedly, dipping his net again through the surface of Hisoka's thoughts. "I believe the best way for the various realms to understand one another is through the easy facilitation of information."

"By telling me your colleague's weaknesses."

The proverbial cat who got the cream could not seem more satisfied than Zepar then. "Now you're starting to get it."

"See, this—this is why I can never quite understand you devils, no matter how deep I get."

Tsukiori's voice brought Hisoka back to himself, and only then did he realize he had been following an invisible lead. He broke his stare with the devil, and turned to Kira.

"You're so quick to turn on your brothers for an imagined slight," she said, "but when it comes to your _Master, _suddenly the smallest iota of information is sacred privilege. It's a wonder Hell continues to function at all with everyone working against one another, let alone actually grow in size century after century."

Zepar's gaze swiveled lazily toward her. "Because Force shites on Reason's back, and nobody wants to take their cues from the guy on the bottom, covered in shit. How about that for an explanation? I bet that's a proverb they never taught you in school." It was clear to Hisoka, however, that the exorcist was a source of some resentment for the devil, no matter how dismissive of her he attempted to sound. "Just what are you asking me, Kira?"

"What Astaroth is getting out of this."

"Nothing. It was all my idea and Focalor's gain. At least, that was the plan."

"I'm not talking about the raid on Minase Hijiri's apartment, you insufferable ass. I mean what he intends to get when he finds Tsuzuki."

The clench of her jaw did not escape Hisoka's attention. Nor Zepar's neither. He sobered. "Why?" he asked her. "Are you worried my answer might mean you'll have to rethink this whole working-with-the-dark-for-the-sake-of-the-light business? Reassess where your loyalties lie? Don't pretend you didn't know damn well what you were getting into when you came to work for Hell. You can justify your reasons all you want, but at the end of the day, you're no different from the officer who shoots his own soldier between the eyes for cowardice. The stock broker who screws the little guy out of his living, but sleeps well at night as long as he tells himself, Well, at least I got the job done.

"You're already a traitor to your race, Kira." The fact was so plain, it needed no further embellishment than that on Zepar's part. "What difference does it make to you what Astaroth stands to gain?"

Watching the exchange, Hisoka was left with the distinct impression that he was missing something crucial. The Tsukiori he knew was unflappable in the face of devils and demons. There had to be more than just his words that made her tremble the way she was trembling now, with a barely contained rage the heat of which was a tangible thing against Hisoka's skin. It made the hairs stand up on his arms and the back of his neck.

"Hey," he said. He couldn't reach out to her physically, but knowing she wasn't alone against the devil might help to calm her down. "You alright?"

Whatever personal demons had been hounding her, they were banished to some farther corner when Tsukiori turned to meet his eyes. "Fine," she told him. "Thank you."

"What just happened? I felt like I lost you for a minute there."

"He has a point, Kira," the devil taunted her. "Maybe you should take five. You look a bit pale, almost as if—jeez, I hate to be so cliché, but the situation's just asking for it—as if you've seen a ghost."

He laughed, and from the corner of his eyes, Hisoka saw Tsukiori's hand move toward the handle of her sword. If ever he could project as well as he received, he hoped she could sense his urging not to give in to rash emotion, and do something she would regret. It was precisely what the devil wanted her to do.

She must have come to the same conclusion herself, for she made a conscious effort to relax her hand, and let it hang at her side.

Her tone, when she spoke again, was even and strong. Back to the all-business Tsukiori Hisoka knew. "No more bullshit, Zepar. Just tell us what Astaroth has planned for Tsuzuki once he finds him."

"There. Was that so hard? You only had to ask."

Zepar took a deep breath, let it slowly out. "My Lord wants the same thing He's always wanted," he told them. "It's time Tsuzuki came home to Hell, where his particular talents are actually appreciated, and assumed his rightful place as Brigade Commander of the Dragon Cavalry. Now that he's forsaken his duties as a subject of King Enma and agent of order between the living realm and the dead, he's free to take the position without any remaining conflict of interest.

"The only problem is, no one knows where to find him. Not Enma, not Hell, nor any mortal that we've contacted. Not even I, for all the thankless long hours I've put into this mission." Zepar chuckled bitterly at that.

"So it's a race, to see who finds him first. And there are some parties involved in it who, I'm to understand, if they win, would sooner destroy him outright than give him a chance to choose his own destiny. I suppose under the assumption that a Tsuzuki who cannot be controlled is a Tsuzuki who could tip the very balance of power between our various planes. Either of his own volition or with a little nudge in the right direction. Apparently the man is a powder keg, and everyone is rushing about, vying either to be the spark that sets him off, or the one who snuffs him out for good.

"Oh, but what do I know about any of that?" the devil said with a flippant shake of his head. "I'm just an errand boy, sent out to bring the prodigal son home. All I know is, destroying Tsuzuki would be a terrible waste of potential if even half of what they say about him is true. The universe is lucky if a soul like that comes into being even once in a millennium.

"So I guess that puts us sort of on the same side, doesn't it? Funny how that works. It seems both of us have a vested interest in keeping Tsuzuki alive."

* * *

The National Police Agency offices of the Kyushu Regional Police Bureau were not a foreign place to Imai, yet every time he'd been asked to come in of late had been under less than pleasant circumstances.

This time was no exception, though at least he could take some comfort that _he_ had been to the one to set the meeting. If one good thing had come out of all those performance reviews and interrogations about his role in the Liver Taker investigation and its aftermath, it was his confidence about the details of the case. He must have pored over them in his mind a thousand times, and having to answer for his own actions repeatedly in front of different panels had polished his responses down to exacting little gems. He knew what he and Asai needed next, and he knew how to ask for it.

There was just one hurdle to get over. . . .

He recognized the confident, commanding clicking of her footsteps before she even came into view. "Oh god." Imai slumped down in his chair. "Here we go."

Every time he saw her, the bass line for Hall and Oates's "Maneater" would start playing in his head. No one else could take a standard, navy, salary-woman two-piece and turn it into a power suit. No one else knew just how to stand in those pumps, with that cock of the hip, and that condescending lopsided grin, to make a man so thoroughly feel like an inferior being. Asai for his part looked up from the magazine he was reading and imparted an approving nod, but he was young and still newly married—what did he know? He didn't yet know _her, _he didn't yet know that the Devil was a woman named Minami Nagai, and she could make your spine wither and die within you with no more than a laugh.

And _god_, did she have a _laugh._ Imai didn't consider himself particularly masochistic, but he would let himself be whipped up and down by that laugh all day, and thank her for it. _That _was how completely she debased him.

After all these years, his heart gave a little leap of self-hating joy when she recognized him, and turned that ball-busting smile his way. He stood and straightened himself out, feeling about as awkward as a school boy meeting his first teacher.

"Detective Imai." She shook her head. "It's been a long time."

"Too long, Nan. I should have stayed in touch."

Her "mm" was neither an affirmation or dissent, though he suspected he no longer had the right to use that nickname and had misstepped in doing so. OK, so the appeal-to-her-emotions tactic fell flat—though Imai was clearly at fault there. He should have remembered she didn't have any.

"But you didn't keep in touch," Nagai said, "and now you need my help. I do hope this isn't about your suspension. I may technically have the power to reinstate you, but both of our superiors would question whether my involvement represented a conflict of interest, or possibly even an ethics violation."

"I assure you," Imai said, "this is about another matter entirely. One of national security. It's just that, I wasn't sure who else would believe me at this point."

"And you needed my clearance, I'm sure." Nagai noticed the bottle of whisky he was carrying then, and gave it a raking look. He was sure she recognized the label, and knew just how expensive it was. "I hope that's not a bribe."

"What, this? Uh, no," Imai stammered, "it's just a gift, from one old, er, _colleague_ to another—"

"It looks like a bribe."

He gritted his teeth. "Yeah, well, the nice thing is, you can drink away the evidence. You want it or not?"

"Well, since you already spent the money. . . ." She put out her hand; and even if Imai had been starting to think he would just drink the whisky himself if she was gonna be such an ungrateful bitch about it—maybe split it with Asai on a child's swing set at the park like the loser he was—as soon as she did so, he was helpless to do anything but comply. "I was afraid you'd bring me something you knitted," Nagai said, "since you have all this free time now to take up a hobby."

Imai laughed heartily, earning him a concerned look from Asai. And with good reason. He had no idea why he was laughing either. It pained his heart.

_Whoa, here she comes, _echoed the immortal, wise words of Daryl Hall. _Watch out, boy, she'll chew you up. . . ._

At last Nagai turned her exacting gaze on Asai. "This must be your partner. Detective Asai, is it?" She extended her hand to the young detective, who showed no fear as he took it. (He's stronger than I, Imai thought.) "I've heard a lot about you."

"Sempai's said good things, I hope," Asai joked in the innocent, unassuming manner that somehow only he ever managed to pull off, and Imai grumbled. The last he'd spoken more than what could fit on a New Year's greeting card to the woman had been before the younger detective had been assigned to him.

Nagai laughed. "I have no idea. But I like to do my homework ahead of time. Unlike some people I can think of."

No question whom that barb was meant for.

"Asai, I'd like you to meet Nagai Minami," Imai told his partner. "Junior commissioner of border security and immigration at the NPSC. And, somehow or other, my ex-wife."

* * *

Ukyou sighed as she slumped back in her office chair. This setback in the animal trials was the last thing she had expected, and they were already behind schedule.

But it was more than that. Another rabbit had died tonight. This one she had been fond of, not just as a promising test subject, but as an individual as well. She had named the damned thing, for god's sake. Of course Ukyou knew it was unwise to get emotional about an animal subject—if she couldn't take this, she might as well find a new field of research altogether—and in all of her scientific training she had prided herself on being able to separate her professional self, and the sacrifices she had to make in this job, from who she was outside the lab. But it still hurt.

Maybe it was the project. She was too personally invested. Her hopes were too high, her expectations too unrealistic, and as a result, the creatures placed in her care had suffered. But was it really too much to hope for a longer, healthier life? Was it too much to ask in this world for health and sanity as a right accorded all creatures of nature, and not a privilege for a randomly selected few? Was that not simply a natural, human desire in a world rife with pain and suffering?

"It's not your fault," Akiyama told her, reading her sigh clear as day. "There was no way we could have predicted self-destructive tendencies of this magnitude. None of the other trials indicated it might result."

"None of the other trials showed such across-the-board integration of the Subject-X chromosome, either." But there had been warning signs before. Depression and lethargy in otherwise healthy individuals, loss of interest in play and sex, a refusal to eat despite an apparent increase in energy. Seemingly minor changes in behavioral patterns, however, compared to bashing one's head against the bars of one's crate until skull and brain were indistinguishable from one another.

"You're the only one who knows what the Subject-X material is truly capable of. There's nothing in the literature to suggest a will to die is somehow encoded in the DNA."

Akiyama was trying to help, Ukyou knew, but it only confirmed for her that she should have known better. "It was so much easier when we were just experimenting on plants," she muttered to herself.

Her assistant, perhaps out of courtesy, acted as though she hadn't heard. "I know it doesn't seem that way right now, but we _are _making headway. The project still shows immense promise for a wide range of applications. If we could just find a way of separating the sequences responsible for the regenerative properties from the ones causing suicidal tendencies—"

"We may be left with an entirely ineffective gene."

Whatever Akiyama had been about to say, she shut her mouth, blinked, and revised: "It's a possibility. But I don't have enough data to make that judgment yet. And I don't think _you_ want to abandon this project any time soon either."

On that she was correct. Even as she sat there, wallowing in this failure, Ukyou's thoughts were whirling: symptoms and implications lining themselves up in lists, numbers and figures moving around in shifting combinations, possible future plans of attack coalescing into being like planets accreting in a newborn solar system. They could move beyond this—_she would _move beyond this.

She just couldn't yet see how.

"In the meantime, you should go home," Akiyama was saying to her, snapping Ukyou out of her thoughts. "Get some rest. And don't say you need to stay and run through the data," her assistant cut off what she had been about to say. "The data will be here when you get back. When was the last time you slept anyway?"

Ukyou ran a hand through her hair. Rubbed life back into her tired eyes. "I can't even remember." The last few days—it was only days, wasn't it?—had all run together.

Her assistant smiled sympathetically at that. "If you can't remember, the answer is 'too long ago.' Go home, ma'am. We can run through the data _after_ you've had some quality sleep."

She made Ukyou promise she would get some. And as Ukyou caught a glimpse of her reflection on the way out, she could see why the other woman had been concerned.

I look like hell, she thought. Her skin, sallow; bags under her eyes; and she couldn't even remember the last time she had sat down to a proper meal. She would do her project—and those test subjects still under her care—no good if she worked herself sick.

She caught the first train back home. The first rays of sunlight were just highlighting the tops of buildings in the east when she arrived at her neighborhood station. This was the most beautiful time of day to Ukyou, when the day was full of promise, a blank slate yet to be filled, and nothing was yet impossible. It was that time she was used to inspiration hitting the hardest, only typically she would be heading in the opposite direction, and what new breakthroughs she had had on the train would be worked through upon arrival at the office.

Her mind was feeling pretty dry at the moment. Perhaps that was why she didn't shrink away when she dragged herself to the kitchen for a glass of water, only to find Tsuzuki waiting for her there, just drying the counter after finishing the dishes.

"Hey." His wide, burgundy eyes blinked concernedly at her over his shoulder. "You're home early. Or should I say late . . .?"

"Late. I think." Ukyou pulled a chair out from the little kitchen set, and collapsed into it. Upon sitting, she couldn't believe she had made it all the way here on her own two feet. "And what about you? Weren't you working all night?"

"Just didn't feel all that tired when I got home. I'll take a catnap before my next shift."

Tsuzuki required no prompting to know just what she needed right then. With fluid, efficient movements, he grabbed a cup and a couple bags of tea, and started filling it up from the hot water dispenser. Ukyou had to marvel that he seemed easier in her kitchen than she did herself these days. Meanwhile, "I think there's some leftover sukiyaki in the fridge if you want me to warm it up. Might be a little heavy fare this early in the morning, but it's better than me trying to make you something."

She smiled. It would be heavy, but somehow she found it hard to refuse his offer. "That would be nice. Thank you."

Setting the mug down before her, he matched her smile.

And pulled away again just as quickly. Said into the refrigerator. "You want to talk about it?"

That was it, she thought. Why she was so grateful he avoided her most days by working late. It would have been uncanny, if she believed in telepathy, how well Tsuzuki could read her moods. He was a very sensitive individual, and compassionate. Another trait he had in common with Kazutaka, though most people would never guess there was that side to the cool, aloof Dr. Muraki he showed the public.

Ukyou thought of the rabbit again, and all the guilt she had suppressed by force of habit at the lab swelled up inside her. She coughed it back down, but just barely. "Not really. Do you want to talk about your night?"

Tsuzuki laughed. It was just an ordinary night for the izakaya, he told her, as he went about preparing the sukiyaki. But he told her all the details anyway—it had been far too long since they'd said much more than a passing word to each other—and Ukyou let her thoughts wander to the easy cadence of his voice.

Her gaze wandered as well, to the opened letters sitting in a rough pile at the other end of the small table. She did not need to read the addresses on them to recognize they were Kazutaka's letters to her.

_He's looking through them again. Is he hoping to find something he missed before?_

Did _he find something? Is he planning to leave?_

Why that thought filled her with a wistful sadness, Ukyou did not know. It was entirely unexpected.

"Tsuzuki," she said, interrupting him (she wasn't paying attention to his story, anyway). "I think you and I need to find a time when we can sit down and talk."

He slowed down. She wondered if he was thinking about the last time they had "sat down" to "talk," too, and how well that had worked out. The shame and discomfort in the kitchen was suddenly palpable, and Ukyou regretted saying anything. But she also knew she had to press through it.

"We both know what happened that night was a mistake." (He _had _to be thinking the same thing.) "But acting like it never happened isn't going to get us past it."

Of course, talking about their true feelings wasn't either of their strong suits, either. But they couldn't keep denying that _something _had happened, even if it was only the result of a very specific set of circumstances that were extremely unlikely to ever be repeated in the same sequence.

"I enjoy your company, Tsuzuki. And I'd like us to be friends. I don't like this awkwardness between us."

"The awkwardness is easy," he said with a forced chuckle.

"I know. But it's already been how many months? Four?"

"Three. And a few weeks, maybe."

"Still too long to have hardly said a word to each other. It's getting to be ridiculous, don't you think? I don't even know if you'll be around much longer—"

Seeing her gaze flash toward the letters, Tsuzuki hurriedly gathered them back up—like a teenage boy caught with dirty magazines, she thought—and stalked out of the room. Ukyou got up to follow him, just as he was shutting them back up in the sideboard drawer.

She folded her arms about herself and leaned against the door jamb. "Did you uncover anything new?" Her own voice sounded small to her ears, anticipatory. Fearful of the answer.

Tsuzuki sighed. "Nothing. I thought there might be some code in his writing that might have hinted at what he was doing, but he was very careful with what details of his life he revealed to you."

And what he hadn't revealed, Ukyou was at once curious to know, and certain she did not actually want to. It was one thing to know what Kazutaka was capable of; another to hear it outright. "Ever since I've known him, he's tried to protect me. At first I thought it was gallant. Now I wonder if he wasn't just ashamed. Of what I might think of him if I knew the truth."

"Maybe. But I think he really was trying to protect you as well."

How many times had she had to hear that old line from Kazutaka—and now Tsuzuki as well? "From what? The law? The scientific community and their ethics committees? His psychopath half-brother who's been dead for twenty years?"

Tsuzuki blinked. "From me."

She shook her head. "You've been trying to tell me ever since you got here how dangerous you are, and honestly, Tsuzuki, I've known house cats more terrifying than you."

"You don't know—you wouldn't understand—"

"I might if you gave me half a chance." But was this really an argument she wanted to have right now? "But your past isn't something you seem particularly eager to tell me about, and so far I've had no problem respecting that. As you can see, I'm used to only getting part of the story from the men in my life. As long as it doesn't interfere with my work, it doesn't matter to me who you were before you came here."

"It should!" She was surprised by the strength of the conviction in Tsuzuki's words. "You're a scientist, aren't you? Shouldn't you want to know?"

"I know when it is, and about which things, that I don't want to know any more." She met his conviction with a bold stare of her own, her jaw tight as she dared him to contradict her. "Sometimes knowing more doesn't help you one bit. There are some things you can't un-know, no matter how much you wish afterwards you could forget. Sometimes it's better to never learn of them in the first place."

"God!" he hissed, his fingers going to his forehead. His voice cracked a little as he said, "I'm sorry. I really don't want to fight you on this—"

"I know." She felt like a mother consoling a repentant son, and didn't like being reminded of the decade's age difference between them. It was a larger gulf than that that somehow kept widening between them, despite what paltry steps they took to try and bridge it. And yet, for all they butted heads, it seemed they should have been on the same side. Whatever else Tsuzuki had been before coming here, he did not need Ukyou reminding him that sometimes ignorance really was bliss. Or at least, better than the alternative.

Just as he knew she didn't need schooling on personal responsibility and looking the other way, when it was clear he harbored some guilt on that front as well.

"We're adults." Ukyou asked him, "We can discuss this like adults, can't we?"

"I . . . I should check on the sukiyaki before it scalds."

She was blocking his access to the kitchen. Ukyou could read the unease in his frame. He hesitated as he moved toward her, and she edged aside to let him.

But he stopped anyway. He would have had to pass her sideways to keep from grazing her shoulder; but rather than do so, he stopped.

She met his eyes, those burgundy eyes which, as close as they were, threatened to engulf her like the surface of the proverbial wine-dark sea. She'd already lost herself once in them, and vowed it would never happen again.

But pinned under his stare, she was aware of the beating of her heart, and of the warmth of his presence, the real, physical weight of him there. In those arms, she knew, it might only be for a little while, but she could forget about the rabbit, and the failure of the trial. She could forget what he had come here to do, and how little she knew about his past. She could forget everything but the aching gentleness of his touch; the sincerity of even the slightest sounds to pass his lips; and the sadness in those dark eyes that coaxed the hidden passion out of her like an instinct, the sadness that reminded her so inexplicably of Kazutaka. Not the one he knew, but _her _Kazutaka. The boy whose mind she so adored and envied, whose guileless smiles she had fallen in love with.

The boy who had proclaimed himself her knight errant, before he became the bane of her existence.

She'd already lost herself in his blissful oblivion once. It would take no great effort to do so again. Ukyou found herself leaning—

But Tsuzuki was not there. He had pushed past to the kitchen to finish warming up the leftovers. Ukyou rubbed her arm beneath the sweater. It was little consolation, but it gave her the nerve to turn back toward the kitchen table and return to her seat.

What little appetite she had had was all but gone when he set the sukiyaki before her. "I have to go out," Tsuzuki said in a small voice that might have been the only clue he acknowledged what had just happened between them. "You're almost out of rice and milk. Maybe a couple other things."

There was a moment of hesitation, like he looked as though he wanted to say something more. Then he was gone, and Ukyou was left alone with the tea and sukiyaki, slowly growing cold before her.

She felt like crying, but didn't know which of the things that had happened that morning was the reason for it. She decided it was better if she didn't know.

* * *

He felt like slamming his fist into a wall, and shattering every bone in his hand. The pain would only last a little while, but it was the least he deserved for being such an idiot.

But it was impulses like those he had come here to resolve, not give in to. That was the Tsuzuki he had wanted to put behind him from the first kindness Ukyou had shown him—herself an example of what a decent human being could be that he wanted desperately to follow, and erase all traces of the demon within, the monster that could have given birth to a man like Muraki.

He'd come here hoping to understand Muraki better, to understand his own role in shaping the lives of all those people the Muraki line had touched; but all Tsuzuki had managed to accomplish was to fall for the one person he could not fall for, the one person he absolutely needed to retain his distance from if he was to use her as a card to be played.

But in the end, just as it always was in the end for him, he had been weak. He'd played the fool, made her drop her guard, and let her get closer to him. He'd been a sympathetic ear to her troubles, empathized with her, and plied her with the whisky he'd brought home from the konbini down the street because, why the hell not, it was New Year's Eve, and even though he'd known it wasn't a good idea for either of them, he'd kept refilling their glasses anyway, knowing in the back of his mind what they needed most _were_ their respective stressors, their respective hurt. _That_ was all that kept them lucid and sane.

But then he looked in her eyes, and in them he had seen everyone he had ever loved: his mother and sister, Hisoka, Hijiri . . . even Tatsumi, when he wasn't being such an insufferable tyrant about expense reports and allowances. All those who could never love him back—not as he needed them to, no, though most of them had tried. He could not blame them for failing when he needed their love the most, knowing the bastard he was, undeserving of love, even if blame them he did.

But _she _was there, and—maybe Ukyou didn't love him at all, maybe he was just her method of release, or she saw some shadow of Muraki in his eyes, some family resemblance she had thought she might lose herself in for a little while. He didn't know what. He didn't care. She had been warm and alive and _human_ beneath his hands, and for a little while, in her arms, he had been able to fool himself that he was too. For that little while he was able to pretend that he was someone worthy of someone like her, someone good.

He had let her lead him. Ukyou may not have been overly experienced, but she was far from virginal, and eager enough that at no time had Tsuzuki considered stopping her. And afterwards, after they had made love a second time, and a third, and she let him hold her in his arms, finally just hold her there, he wondered if she regretted what they had done; or if some rebellious streak within her was glad for it, though it was nothing less than a betrayal of Muraki's supposed devotion to her.

Tsuzuki wondered now how much she remembered. (They'd both been rather hammered, but he at least was used to functioning inebriated, and metabolized alcohol quickly. Rather more quickly than he liked.) They never talked about it, other than when they talked _around _it, like this morning. Not even the morning after, over their painfully awkward breakfast. They had just . . . agreed, tacitly, to pretend it never happened.

Until this morning. And it drove Tsuzuki crazy that she had broken that agreement. Couldn't she see the irresponsibility of what they had done? Couldn't she see how wrong it had been, how it shamed him? Why couldn't she just let him have that?

And he hated that he could not forget about it. It wasn't the act that bothered him, but what it meant for them now, how impossibly tangled this otherwise simple situation had become. It was one thing to give a dying young woman a last—and in some cases, first—taste of a man's affection. For god's sake, Hijiri had stirred something in him Tsuzuki thought well buried, something he had thought he might explore with Hisoka, before discovering just how damaged his partner was made any overtures to that effect out-of-the-question.

It hardly mattered now, of course. That had been years ago, and he had not seen Hijiri since. He wasn't sure the lad—now a grown man, if he was still alive—would even remember him. And Hisoka—

Well, Tsuzuki wasn't sure they would ever meet again; and if they did, whether circumstances would allow them to meet as friends. Whatever notions he may have once entertained that their relationship could grow beyond the professional, closer than simply emotional—if that door had not been closed on their last case together, it certainly was now.

But Ukyou remained. Or rather, _Tsuzuki _remained. He was a stubborn rash upon her life, he thought with a mordant humor, that simply would not go away. He should have moved on long ago, whether he had found any further leads on Muraki's whereabouts or not. As soon as it occurred to him that he could in no way conscionably use Ukyou against Muraki, as soon as it became apparent he wanted to protect her too, that was when he should have left.

Instead, he had taken a night job.

It hardly excused sticking around. But it provided a source of income, and it kept him out of the house during those hours when Ukyou was winding down from work, and when temptation raged the loudest.

Having her home this morning threw the whole thing out of whack. Tsuzuki passed some time idly wandering the grocery store aisles, but he couldn't do it all day; and the time left between the present and the start of his shift seemed to stretch on forever.

When he had thought enough time had passed, he chanced coming back, and was relieved more than words could say to find Ukyou sleeping peacefully in her room.

He laid himself down for a nap as well, but sleep persistently evaded him, chased away by the loud, tangled mess of his thoughts. He got up a few hours later, thoroughly exhausted and unsatisfied, and made sure he left the house before Ukyou could wake. Before he had to see all the unanswered questions left in Ukyou's eyes, staring into his very soul.

"Lady trouble?" Mr. Saito asked him when he arrived earlier than usual at the izakaya that evening.

Tsuzuki managed a bashful smile for his benefit. "I told you. My lady friend is just that: a friend."

"The fact that you call her your 'lady friend' speaks volumes, son." But the old man sobered when it was clear Tsuzuki was never going to relent on that issue. "You know you're going to have to tell me the identity of your mystery benefactor eventually. I know just about everyone in this neighborhood. I'm bound to figure it out sooner or later."

"I'll let her be the judge of that," Tsuzuki told him. "If she wants you to know who she is, she'll decide when and how to tell you herself."

"M-m, fair enough, I suppose." He could see the gears turning in Saito's head, wondering if he'd already interacted with the woman in question and simply had yet to connect the dots. Tsuzuki wondered if Ukyou was one of those that the old man knew.

And he wondered, not for the first time, just how much longer he would be able to keep his presence in this town a secret.

* * *

"_Now _you look human," Miyake remarked the next morning, when Ukyou joined them at the lab well rested.

With clipboard to hide her smile, Akiyama glanced over at them out of the corner of her eye.

"I feel much better," Ukyou told them both. "And you're right, Ms. Akiyama: a good night's sleep is the best medicine. Aside from the one Subject-X will help us create, that is, and I am ready to work past this latest setback. We will learn from it, and make damn sure our treatment has fewer side effects in the next trial."

Her determination to keep going was just what the two assistants needed to hear. They set to work, and Ukyou found herself re-energized, not only by fourteen non-consecutive hours of restful sleep, but by her colleagues' attitudes as well. This was why she had gone into pharmaceutical medicine, after all—not because it was what her father did, or so that she and Kazutaka might have one more passion in common, though there were those who believed both of those to be true.

It was the promise of science to work wonders, a promise she still believed in though she knew others in the medical field saw such a view as naïve or idealistic. Without ideals, she told them time and again, there could be no progress. Every new innovation started out as someone's seemingly impossible dream.

And she still believed in the promise locked up inside Subject-X's DNA. Already she had seen it transform blossoming cherry trees from a symbol of transient beauty to one of perpetual youth, and made roses bloom in winter, defying the proverbial reason for God's creation of memory. If it could accomplish those "impossible" feats in plant life, there was no telling what the gene could do for humans' standard of living.

Her mourning period over, Ukyou's afternoon consisted of examining samples taken from the project's latest casualties. She doubted she would find any evidence for an inducement of suicide under the microscope—even neurologists are clueless when it comes to the motivations that ultimately drive our actions, she reminded herself—but there might be symptoms of some other weakness in the tissues, something that she could quantify and take measures to correct.

A fluttering in her stomach kept distracting her from her work, however. At first she thought she might have drunk too much coffee that morning (on occasion, the caffeine made her vision swim not unlike seasickness, and switching between a microscope and her notes had a tendency to exacerbate the effects); but as the hours dragged on and the fluttering became a distinct nausea, she wondered if something else might be the cause. Was she coming down with flu? With as little sleep as she had been getting lately, her immune system could have been weakened enough to catch a bug.

She tried to ignore it, but the churning was simply too much. Her gorge rose, and she rushed to the sink, waiting—and not long—for her body to reject her lunch.

When the heaving had finally stopped, and the wave of disorientation dissipated somewhat, Ukyou reached for a thermometer. Her forehead felt cool to her own touch, but the instrument confirmed it: She was not running a fever.

Perhaps it was the sukiyaki from yesterday's breakfast. Leftovers from restaurants were notorious as breeding grounds for bacteria, and if she hadn't been in such a funk and hungry, she should have told Tsuzuki no. But if the food was bad, why would it take more than a day to finally affect her?

Another possibility surfaced, but Ukyou quickly squelched it.

_No. I can't possibly . . ._

But it persisted, so she did the math up in her head. Twice. Thrice over, just to be sure. True, it had been awhile since the last time she had menstruated, but during times of stress and overwork, the lack of proper sleep and nutrition had made her skip a month more than once before.

_But not three months in a row. And the last time was . . . when, exactly? Must have been before Tsuzuki and I—_

Ukyou paled. Her hand flew to her mouth, and she realized it was shaking. Quickly she checked the door to make sure she was still alone; she didn't want to alarm her colleagues, or have them press her with questions she didn't yet have answers to. She mustn't get ahead of herself, she reminded herself. The data wasn't in, she had nothing to base such a wild and ridiculous theory on at this point but circumstantial evidence.

Yet circumstantial evidence suggested that she was very possibly pregnant.


End file.
